Charm School for Ninjas
by Ambrant Arandel
Summary: A B Ranked mission in a boarding school? Slight romantic themes. SasukexSakura and NarutoxHinata. Rated M for Safety. Completed.
1. The Briefing

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Charm School for Ninjas**

**A Naruto Fanfiction**

**Chapter 1. The Briefing.**

Sakura was staring at Sasuke, again. Naruto tried to take his mind off his crush's incessant mooning over the brooding ninja and tried to find something else to think about. He failed miserably. This was the early morning, before he had to think about anything even remotely serious, well not that Sakura wasn't a serious topic, but it was when he spent most of his time daydreaming about her and he could pass his lack of attention off as still being sleepy.

Sasuke was his usual brooding self and Naruto was just getting ready to start the day's sparring match of words when the unthinkable happened. They arrived at the bridge to find Kakashi waiting for them.

The three of them stopped in their tracks exchanging uneasy glances. There he was, waiting on THEM and looking dead serious. Kakashi had never been early. There were times when the training was critical, and he was a little less late than usual, but he was never early.

Naruto squinted his eyes expecting Kakashi to transform into a log or something with one of his replacement jutsus, but he never did.

"If you three could get a move on, I'd appreciate it." Kakashi said impatiently.

"Didn't you go home last night?" Sakura asked their sensei. "Why were you out here all night."

"I wasn't." Kakashi said seriously. "We have a big mission today and I want to get started as quickly as possible.

The three ninjas looked at each other. "Are you SURE you're Kakashi?" Naruto asked quietly, you aren't some sort of enemy ninja trying to POSE as Kakashi are you?"

"No Naruto, it's me. We've got to get over to the school. We've got to meet with the other team that's going to be assisting us on this mission." Kakashi said seriously. "So let's get going."

Naruto huffed all the way to the school. It would be the ONE day that Kakashi would decide to be early. He was having SUCH a nice daydream about Sakura too. Ahhh Sakura-chan…

"NARUTO!" Kakashi scolded. "Stay focused."

Naruto jumped and then nodded seriously. It must be a big deal if Kakashi was being this serious and focused.

The three young ninjas walked into the meeting room and had a seat. Kakashi was tapping his foot impatiently until the other team arrived. Kiba, Shino, and Hinata all wandered into the room followed by Kurenai.

"It's about time you got here." Kakashi said impatiently.

"Sorry, had to help a little old lady across the street." Kurenai said impishly.

Most of what was transpiring was over Naruto's head, but he knew Kakashi was seldom this serious without a very good reason.

"On to the mission briefing." Kakashi said finally. "We're sending the six of you out for a very important mission that's going to require some very intense and special training." Kakashi said taking charge of the group with military command.

"Yes!" The young ninjas nearly cried in unison. "What's the mission?" Naruto cried enthusiastically.

"We're sending you to charm school!" Kakashi said with aggressive ferocity.

"WHAT!" They all cried with astonishment. Except of course for Hinata who just looked on in confusion.

"The village has been given a mission to infiltrate a finishing school for young girls. This mission will require sacrifices from each of us, but I'm expecting 110 from both teams on this one." Kakashi said emphatically.

"Well, that explains why Kakashi-sensei is so enthusiastic." Sakura said under her breath next to Naruto.

"Mm." Naruto and Sasuke grunted in reply.

"Are there any questions before we beginning giving out assignments?" Kakashi asked the group.

"Yeah! Why do WE have to get stuck with this kind of assignment?" Naruto said out loud.

"For once, Naruto and I agree." Sasuke said smirking.

"Well, for starters. This group is the only one available that has the necessary cross section of characteristics and abilities to complete this mission." Kakashi said sagely.

"That and Kakashi is probably wanting to play voyeur for the entire mission." Sakura said quietly to her two teammates.

"I still don't see why…" Naruto started.

"It's a "B" ranked mission." Kakashi threw in.

"…anyone would possibly want anyone but us to handle this." Naruto finished.

Naruto noticed that Kakashi now had Sasuke's undivided attention as well.

"You mean that there are going to be other ninja in this mission that we will be required to fight?" Sasuke said hopefully.

"We're hoping that this will not be the case, but yes, you will be going up against other ninja. A jounin to be precise." Kakashi stated bluntly.

Naruto and Sasuke both settled in to listen to the mission. This was going to be wonderful.

"First of all let me start by saying that we do NOT intend to let you fight a jounin. We want you there to spy. If a confrontation is to take place you need to get in touch with Kurenai or myself immediately." Kakashi said seriously. Naruto glanced at Sasuke who looked back at Naruto as if to say _Yeah, right like that going to happen. I'm going to get him first idiot._ Naruto couldn't blame him similar thoughts were running through his mind as well.

"Secondly, for this mission, Hinata is going to be temporarily assigned to group seven. Kiba, you and Shino are going to be with Kurenai on this mission." Kakashi was saying. Hinata looked ready to faint, but no one else really took it as much of an announcement.

"Finally we're going to be splitting up the groups. This is our target." Kakashi was saying as he handed out rather painstakingly detailed portfolios to the teams. "We are going to be investigating the Summer Lake Finishing School for Girls. We are also going to be watching the Lakeview School for Boys."

The teams took out their portfolios that had detailed maps and pictures of the areas around the two schools. The schools sat across from each other on a large lake deep in the seclusion of the forest. Naruto noticed that the floor plan for the girl's dormitory was EXTREMELY well made. "You made these yourself didn't you Kakashi-sensei."

"Why yes I did, Naruto. It pays to be thorough." Kakashi said appreciatively while Kurenai just snorted.

"Anyway, Kiba, Shino, and Kurenai are heading out today. They will be covering the Lakeview School for boys in case the jounin we're looking for is working out of that school." Kakashi said in a business-like manner.

"So do we know who this jounin is or what his target might be?" Sasuke asked.

"Very good question Sasuke." Kakashi complimented. "The answer is 'no' on both points. Government spies passed on the information to us that they had intercepted intelligence that a jounin was going to try to either take hostage or try to assassinate one of the girls. Summer Lake is a finishing school for some of the wealthiest young girls in the nation. Each of them has an affluent father who is either extremely wealthy, or is a high-ranking government official. Unfortunately, we don't know who their target will be, who the jounin is, whether they are male or female, or even what village they come from. That's where you six come in. Your mission parameters are this: find the jounin, protect the girls, and try to find out the jounin's target if possible."

The six young ninjas looked at each other. This was definitely going to be a big job. Finally, Sakura piped up. "How long before the jounin attacks?"

Kakashi sighed. "We don't know that either. We DO know that it is probably going to occur sometime during the upcoming semester. We intend to stay there until the problem is solved."

All the young ninjas nodded in agreement. Finally, Kurenai collected Shino and Kiba and they were off, leaving Hinata to Kakashi and group seven. "So what do we have to do Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto said earnestly.

"Well, we have a little more time as Summer Lake starts a couple days later than Lakeview. We'll meet tomorrow and I'll get you started on the training exercises you're going to have to master before we leave." Kakashi said seriously. "I suggest you go home and make preparations to be gone for a few months. We'll set out the day after tomorrow. In the meantime, Hinata please meet us tomorrow on the bridge for training."


	2. The Training

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 2. The Training.**

The sun was just rising as the new team seven plus one arrived at the bridge. Again, Kakashi was already waiting on them. "Right this way to the training grounds. Everyone look alive, we have a lot to do today."

Naruto secretly wished Kakashi-sensei would fall off the bridge, but no such luck came to him. Finally they arrived at the training grounds, and being pretty much miserable about having to be up and about at such an early hour Naruto began to whine. "So what do we have to do for this special mission sensei?" Naruto started.

"Well, you're going to have to infiltrate the girls dorms." Kakashi said seriously.

"I bet you're loving this." Sasuke accused.

"Not as much as you might think. You four have been enrolled as first year students at the finishing school." Kakashi grinned.

The two boys of the group looked at each other and then at their sensei. "Did I hear you right sensei?" Naruto said in surprise.

"Yes, you did. The four of you have been enrolled in the girl's school." Kakashi said flatly.

Three. Two. One…

"IN CASE YOU HAVEN'T NOTICED, WE'RE BOYS!" Sasuke and Naruto cried in unison.

"Such astute observation skills." Kakashi said sarcastically. "I wonder why you even need a teacher."

Sasuke glared at Kakashi a moment and looked ready to jump their sensei. Naruto was about ready to help.

"I told you. You were selected for this mission for a reason." Kakashi said patiently.

"Why aren't they sending the other kunoichi?" Sakura asked mildly.

"Because the rest of them are currently on assignment, except for you Hinata. We have to have YOUNG girls for this assignment. We can't use just ANY kunoichi." Kakashi said mildly. "Of course, if Sasuke and Naruto aren't feeling up to this "B" ranked mission, I'm sure I could swap them out with Temara and Ino on their "D" ranked missions."

Sasuke growled and Naruto grimaced. "B-rank mission, B-rank mission, B-rank mission…" They said in unison, reminding themselves of why they were there.

"So what do we have to do…" Sasuke said finally.

"Well, Naruto was selected for this mission because we finally found a use for his 'Sexy no Jutsu'." Kakashi said leering openly.

Naruto wanted to faint. He really didn't like this mission.

"That's fine for the idiot, but what am I supposed to do?" Sasuke countered.

"Why isn't it obvious? You're supposed to learn the technique from him." Kakashi said simply.

"WHAT!" Sasuke and Naruto once again cried in unison. "There's no way I'm learning that disgraceful jutsu from that idiot." Sasuke finished.

Naruto was ready to puke. He REALLY didn't like this mission.

"That's not the only reason you two were selected." Kakashi continued. "Even a technique like the 'Sexy no Jutsu' takes a certain amount of chakra. Unfortunately, chakra isn't a limitless supply. You two have the highest chakra reserve of any of the other students. You two will be able to maintain your jutsu for the time required to complete the mission. You could probably go for days."

Naruto looked at Sasuke. He'd never measured to see how long he could keep up the jutsu. He could do a few hours, but all day?

"Still Kakashi-sensei, we're going to need to rest eventually." Naruto said thinking about it.

"That's why Hinata is here. The dorm rooms fit four girls each. We wouldn't be able to send in a team of three and give you any privacy to change back into boys, so we're having to send in a team of four." Kakashi said reasonably.

Three. Two. One…

"YOU MEAN I HAVE TO SHARE A DORM ROOM WITH NARUTO!" Sakura yelled in consternation. Naruto noticed that she hadn't said anything about sharing a room with Sasuke. Hinata had just fainted.

"Yes, you do. For this mission to succeed it is going to require all of you to work together. That's why I'm putting you in charge of this mission, Sakura." Kakashi said smiling at her from under his mask.

"I'm in charge?" Sakura said meekly.

"Yes, you have the most experience dealing with Naruto and Sasuke. They're going to have to pass as young girls, plus you're the brains of this outfit. They're going to need your help channeling and controlling their chakra more effectively in order to be able to go for longer periods without changing back. I don't have to tell you, that if they change back at the wrong moment the entire mission could be blown." Kakashi said seriously. "Think you can handle it?"

Sakura turned to look at Naruto, and Sasuke. "I don't know. They're pretty rough around the edges."

Naruto could feel his eye twitching as he looked at Sakura. He knew Sasuke's eye was too.

Finally, Sasuke had had enough. "There is no way I am going to be taught to act like some… ANNOYING GIRL!" Sasuke shouted finally.

Kakashi sighed. "You have no idea do you."

"What?" Sasuke asked shortly.

"What it means to be a ninja." Kakashi countered. "It's called Steganography, the art of hiding something in plain sight." With that, Kakashi transformed into a puppy. The puppy looked around sniffed himself, then licked himself and walked over to Naruto before trying to pee on Naruto's leg.

"Hey watch it, sensei." Naruto said jumping back.

The puppy then started 'getting fond' of Sasuke's leg.

"Get off pervert!" Sasuke yelled. He kicked the dog and it went flying through the air. In midair, it transformed back into Kakashi who then walked back over to the group.

"Now was that something I would normally do?" Kakashi asked.

"Well, I really don't know about the leg humping thing." Naruto started.

"Very funny Naruto." Kakashi said growling. "The point I'm trying to make is that if you were going to be on the look out for a ninja would you pay attention to a dog that acted like a dog?"

"I guess not." Sasuke conceded reluctantly.

"So if a ninja were disguised as a girl…" Kakashi coaxed.

"You wouldn't notice him as long as he was acting like a normal girl." Naruto finished.

"Precisely. Now show us your jutsu Naruto, but please remain clothed, we don't want Hinata fainting again." Kakashi said.

"Too late." Sakura noted.

Naruto quickly transformed into his female self. He rather liked how she looked. He had studied long and hard to find the most attractive form possible.

Sasuke's eye wouldn't stop twitching as he watched Naruto closely. Naruto decided to have some fun, since Hinata was already out like a light, and walked over coyly to Sasuke. "Don't worry Sasuke, I won't bite." He giggled. "Much."

Sasuke deliberately stepped away and pointed at Naruto. "Just because I have to go along with this doesn't mean I have to like it." Sasuke said defensively.

Naruto pouted for a moment as Sakura helped up Hinata. "Well, don't think it's going to be easy. You'll probably look hideous for your first few tries."

With that, Sasuke transformed. Naruto looked at the vision of female beauty before him and didn't know whether to deck Sasuke, or kiss him. He was still in his customary clothes, but his jacket was bulging out, and his hair was shoulder length with two ponytails running down to mid-back from underneath. He had the most delicious looking lips and…

(A/N: For better visual, think of Marlene Angel from Blue Gender with Black hair. I think there's a pretty good picture of her in the Fanart section of mediaminer)

"Argh. I can't believe you got it on the first try!" Naruto cried in anguish. _And I REALLY need to get those thoughts out of my head! Got to remember this is Sasuke, not some raven haired sex goddess._

Sasuke looked over his new body appreciatively. "You know, this might not be so bad after all. I look better than you do Naruto."

"What? No WAY are you better looking than I am!" Naruto shouted back. Hinata was just starting to get back up as he turned to her. "Hinata, which of us is better looking."

"Gone again." Sakura noted dryly as Hinata once again slumped to the ground.

"I do too look better than you do." Sasuke said smugly. "My breasts are even bigger."

"They are not!"

"Are too."

"Are not!"

"Are too."

Kakashi finally stepped between the two new girls trying to placate them. "Now, now, it doesn't matter which of you is prettier as long as you pass for girls and quite frankly, I'm impressed. Besides," Kakashi said copping a feel, "you're both exactly the same size."

Unfortunately, at least for Kakashi, with his hands thus 'predisposed' he was totally unable to block the double punch he got from the two 'boys'. He flew through the air into the water.

"Down again." Sakura noted clinically as Hinata tried to get up, saw the scene, and passed out again.

Finally after a few rounds of fighting each other and trying to beat each other senseless, Kakashi finally got his crew rounded up. "Now for the second part of today's exercise."

"What now?" Sasuke asked acidly. "You want us to mud wrestle for you or something?"

Kakashi spaced out for a moment as if considering it, and then snapped out of it. "No. Now you're going to learn the finer points of… shopping."

Naruto and Sasuke looked at each other again. "B-ranked mission, B-ranked mission, B-ranked mission…"

"What do you want them to shop for?" Sakura asked looking at the two girls in boy clothing having a sneaky suspicion. "We're supposed to be issued school uniforms right?"

"That's correct Sakura. However, the boys are going to need some clothes for when you aren't in uniform. Here's a list of clothes that they'll need. The client is paying for the tab for this shopping spree, so you'll probably want to take the opportunity to get some appropriate clothing for yourselves as well. Make sure they have everything they need," Kakashi moved over to catch Hinata. "…and they'll need the basics. Socks, shoes, braspantiesandmakeup." Kakashi cried as he caught Hinata half way down this time.

"Wait a minute, I didn't catch that last part." Sasuke said slowly. Naruto was getting a sinking feeling in stomach and it had NOTHING to do with Kyuubi.

"The school uniform is a skirt. It's not going to look right if the two of you are wearing boxers underneath. You're also going to need to keep those things from shaking around everywhere." Kakashi said pointing as he finally gave up and just dropped Hinata.

"Sakura, you take Sasuke and walk him through getting some clothes. Naruto, you take Hinata with you when she wakes up." Kakashi said finally. "We'll meet back here tomorrow and set out. Remember, you too. I don't want anything jeopardizing my spying… I mean our mission, so if I catch either of you with male clothes packed in your bags tomorrow, I'll make you walk to Summer Lake naked."

The three conscious members of team seven nodded and Sakura and Sasuke set out. Naruto sat down next to Hinata and tried to wake her up…


	3. Shopping

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 3. Shopping.**

The horror. Sasuke watched as Sakura moved among the racks of No-Man's-Land. He was standing in the aisle of the store looking at her as she casually picked up _things_ for him to wear. It was like watching his brother idly picking out what knife to gut him with.

"How about these Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked as she held up a pair of panties with pink bows all over them.

"I don't do pink." Sasuke said slowly.

"Well, how about these white ones then?" Sakura asked girlishly.

"You can see through those things." Sasuke said looking at the offending garments. "I'm not a slut you know."

"Hey, I have some like these!" Sakura said defensively.

"Your point being?" Sasuke asked acidly. "Why don't we just get something simple? Like these out here in the packs of four?"

Sakura looked at the packages and shrugged. "I just thought you might want something more comfortable."

"These look comfortable." Sasuke said finally. He was beginning to wonder if Sakura was enjoying this just a little bit too much. He decided to file it along with the idea Sakura in lacey underwear in the 'disturbing' section of his memory along with memories of his brother, and a few other things that seemed to be getting pulled out for him to be subjected too.

Sasuke finally pulled Sakura out of the underwear section toward less exotic articles of clothing like socks and sleepwear. Sasuke went and retrieved several pairs of socks, which unfortunately all had lace around them. He also grabbed a nightshirt, which looked like it would reach to his knees. He finally turned ready to leave.

"Where are you going?" Sakura asked.

"To check out."

"We're not done yet. You don't even have a bra yet." Sakura said sweetly.

"I am. If there's anything else I need just get it for me." Sasuke said sighing wearily. His back was starting to hurt.

"Really!" Sakura said as her eyes lit up.

Something within Sasuke's mind suddenly turned on and his brain began registering the possibilities of what would happen if he left his wardrobe up to Haruno Sakura. Visions of him running around in lingerie suddenly revived his interest in the endeavor.

"On second thought, I better stay." Sasuke said sighing.

Sakura looked crestfallen, but didn't stop until she had loaded Sasuke down with several items, and had picked out several for herself. Sasuke thought the ordeal was finally over, but fate had once again dealt him the cosmic wedgie.

"Where are we going now?" Sasuke asked impatiently.

"We have to try everything on silly." Sakura said as she and Sasuke were headed to the dressing rooms.

"Please. I'm sure they'll fit." Sasuke said desperately.

"Well, you don't want to waste money buying clothes only to find they don't fit do you?" Sakura asked as they set their things down in front of the dressing room.

"The clients paying for this." Sasuke ventured.

"All the more reason not to waste money, since we're on a budget." Sakura instructed. "Now, I'm supposed to be in charge, so march in there and try these on."

Sasuke looked at the ensemble that Sakura had picked out for him. It included a dark blue dress, frilly white socks, and a pair of lacey panties that were NOT out of the packages he'd selected, and a matching bra. Sasuke was ready to crawl away in despair.

"Just do it Sasuke." Sakura said finally after a few minutes of watching him stare at the garments.

"This day couldn't possibly get any worse." Sasuke said angrily.

"Hi everybody!" Naruto said with his perky blonde girly voice.

"I stand corrected." Sasuke said as depression quickly set in.

"I finally got Hinata awake, so we came to get some shopping done." Naruto said joyfully.

"Where is Hinata anyway?" Sakura asked.

"She had to go to the bathroom, her nose started bleeding while I was picking out underwear." Naruto said cluelessly.

Sasuke looked at the clothes in his hand and dropped the lacey panties in favor of the pack of underwear he'd picked out. "I'm wearing these and that's final." Sasuke said stubbornly.

"But aren't those the uncomfortable ones?" Naruto asked.

Sasuke looked at Naruto for a long time and noticed Sakura doing the same. "Naruto, I find the fact that you know the difference disturbing on many levels."

"Hey, that's just what Hinata said!" Naruto said blushing.

"Riiiiight." Sakura said slowly. "Tell me Naruto, you didn't by chance have any of this stuff already in your wardrobe did you?"

Naruto looked ready to fume when Hinata walked up. Sasuke had to admit he felt better; ridiculing Naruto usually did that for him.

"Have you tried on your new clothes yet, Naruto-kun?" Hinata asked shyly.

"Not yet. Sasuke is holding up the show." Naruto said nonchalantly.

"I'm getting there…" Sasuke said testily.

"Aren't those the uncomfortable…" Hinata started.

"I think they're comfortable, so back off!" Sasuke said loosing his cool.

"And how exactly is it that YOU know how comfortable they are?" Naruto said grinning madly.

Sasuke resisted the urge to punch Naruto and stepped into the changing room. He started getting undressed and started to dress in the outfit Sakura had given him. He was a little unsettled not seeing the old Uchiha these when he dropped his shorts, but just tried to focus on the mission. Sadly he finally had to admit it even to himself. The underwear he had picked out were uncomfortable. Resolving to find more agreeable underwear, Sasuke finally got into the dress.

"Sakura?" Sasuke asked quietly.

"Yes?" Came Sakura's reply from outside the dressing room.

"What moron puts a zipper in the back of a dress where you can't reach it?"

After about an hour the four young ninjas set out for home. Sakura and Hinata finally parted from their company leaving Naruto and Sasuke. "So we're supposed to stay like this for as long as we can?" Sasuke was asking Naruto.

"Yeah, apparently. I have to admit this is the longest I've ever stayed as a girl." Naruto confided.

"Yeah, well as soon as this mission is over I'm never going to do this again." Sasuke said as he hefted the huge bag full of his clothes.

"You never know, you two might grow to like it." Kakashi said as he appeared out of nowhere.

The two young ninja looked at Kakashi as if he were a lecherous old pervert who might try to grab them at any moment, thus proving their firm grip on reality.

"What do you want Kakashi-sensei." Naruto said backing up slightly from the older ninja.

"I just wanted to let you two know that I've found the perfect names for the two of you while you're undercover." Kakashi said proudly. "Until further notice you are going to be Uchiha Shiori, and you are going to be Uzumaki, Naniko."

"Joy." The two said in unison without much enthusiasm.

"Well, I'll see you in the morning. Don't be late. I'm going to instruct Sakura and Hinata to start referring to you by your aliases so that you'll get used to them." Kakashi said before disappearing.

Sasuke looked at Naniko and Naruto looked back at Shiori. "B-rank mission, B-rank mission, B-rank mission…" They said in unison as they headed off for their own homes.


	4. The First Day

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 4. The First Day.**

Jun'ko looked at the batch of first year girls that were to be assigned to her dormitory. They were all first years, and as such they were only at most in their early teens, but she could already tell they were going to be a handful. They all stood about the common room in their little short skirts and sailor type shirts looking pretty. She looked down at her roster and once again wondered why she hadn't gone into catering.

"All right girls!" Jun'ko cried out for everyone to hear. "Roll call."

"Anda Kimi."

"Here." Said a tall young girl with a raven black ponytail. She had her arms crossed with her hips stuck off to one side that screamed 'attitude problem'.

"Haruno Sakura."

"Here." Said a young girl with pink hair.

"We don't allow hair coloring in the dorms Sakura, so that better wash out or else last the semester." Jun'ko said sternly.

"Yes ma'am." Sakura said quietly.

"Hyuuga Hinata."

"Here." The girl's voice was so quiet that Jun'ko nearly didn't hear her. She had short dark hair and pale blue eyes. Well, at least she had ONE quiet one in the group.

"Maiya Nariko."

"Here." The girl said quietly. She was a small looking brunette, which had gentle look about her.

"Mitsu Takara."

"Here." The young girl said enthusiastically. She was practically beaming and looked like she was quite possibly the happiest one to be there.

"Nikki Yoshiko."

"Here." The raven-haired young girl looked sweet and innocent. Jun'ko hoped that looks weren't deceiving.

"Uchiha Shiori."

There was a long dramatic pause before Jun'ko heard "Here." This time it was from a young raven-haired girl who had her hands in her pockets and was slouching.

"Stand up straight girl, we expect good posture at this school." Jun'ko reprimanded.

The girl slowly stood up straight bringing her nearly to the height of the first girl Kimi. She also looked like she had an attitude problem.

"Uzumaki Naniko."

A long silence permeated the dormitory common room, and after a while Shiori elbowed the blonde next to her. "That's you dope."

"Oh. Here." Said a petite young blonde girl with pigtails. Jun'ko sighed. Great, she had another bubble headed blonde to deal with.

Finally Jun'ko put away her roster and pulled out the dorm assignments. "OK, girls, my name is Satunabe Jun'ko. I'll be the housemistress for this dorm. You girls are going to be spending your time here with me. I will also be your home economics teacher. Anything you need to know must be brought to me."

The blonde's hand shot up immediately. "Yes, Naniko?"

"When do we eat?"

"Later." Jun'ko said irritably. "Now if you'll follow me, I'll assign you to your rooms."

Jun'ko walked upstairs to the rooms the girls would be staying in. She then looked down at her room assignments. "Well, this is odd."

"What is it, Satunabe-sama?" The pink haired girl asked.

"Well, normally, Kimi, Sakura, Hinata, and Nariko would be sharing a room, but it says here that the dean has ordered that Kimi, Nariko, Takara, and Yoshiko share room one and that Sakura, Hinata, Shiori, and Naniko will be sharing room two. There must be a mistake." Jun'ko said confused.

"There's no mistake ma'am." Sakura said smiling. "Hinata, Shiori, Naniko, and I all went to school together before we came here. Daddy must have requested we be put together."

Jun'ko frowned but didn't say anything. This girl must have a powerful or wealthy father to get the dean to break with procedure as she was. "Very well, then off to your rooms and start unpacking. The bathroom is down the hall."

"Down the hall?" Shiori and Naniko said in unison. The two looked horrified.

"Yes, down the hall. There you will find the toilets and the showers." Jun'ko said sternly. "This isn't like home. You aren't Daddy's little princess while you're here. There is no maid to clean up after you and there aren't private rooms with your very own bubble bath. You are here to learn how to become proper young women, not spoiled, distempered, little hellions."

Shiori and Naniko were looking at each other with horrified expressions. Obviously she was dealing with a couple of pampered little brats.

"There is no way I'm taking a shower with a bunch of girls." Sasuke said vehemently.

"Well, it's not like you've got much of a choice." Sakura said looking around their room.

The room was built with two sets of bunk beds, one to the left and one to the right. Sakura looked over the accommodations before making a few decisions.

"Alright, Sasuke, you sleep on the top bunk on my side and Naruto, you sleep on the top bunk on Hinata's side." Sakura said waving left and right respectively.

"Why do I have to be on your side?" Sasuke complained.

"And why do we have to be on top?" Naruto piped in.

"Because I don't want to worry about you being on the bottom bunk on my side in case you decide to try to look up my SKIRT!" Sakura said waving a fist under Naruto's nose. "Besides, I'm the one in charge remember."

"Fine, whatever." Sasuke said as he threw his bags up onto the bed above Sakura's.

Sakura watched the two girls go about unpacking while she tried to work through the rest of their problems. Sasuke finished unpacking first.

"I'm changing back for a little while to rest." Sasuke announced.

"I wouldn't." Naruto warned.

"Shut up, dope." Sasuke said as he released his jutsu. Sakura watched as Sasuke shifted back to being a male. Sakura suddenly heard a rip as Sasuke grabbed his groin and dropped to his knees groaning.

Naruto was laughing maniacally. "I tried to warn you. Changing back into a boy while wearing girl's panties isn't the brightest of ideas."

Sasuke looked up at Naruto with a scowl. "I take it you know this from experience?"

Naruto suddenly stopped laughing and glared back at Sasuke. The two of them had too much testosterone even when they were girls.

"OK Naruto, stop teasing Sasuke." Sakura glared at Naruto. "We have to decide what we're going to do about showers. Who takes evening showers?"

Naruto raised his hand and Sakura looked around for anyone else. "OK, then the easiest thing to do is for Sasuke and Naruto to take their showers at night before bed and Hinata and I will take our showers in the morning before class. That way you two won't be seeing us naked." Sakura said with a shudder. She wouldn't mind showering with Sasuke, but Sakura banished the idea before her nose started bleeding.

"So what about other girls that might be taking their shower in the evening too?" Naruto said dumbly.

"That's THEIR problem." Sakura said emphatically.

"So how are we all supposed to change in the same room?" Hinata asked shyly.

"Easy. Sasuke and Naruto can change into their night clothes when they go to take their shower and you and I can change while their gone, and the two of you will have to get up and get out of the room while Hinata and I are in the shower so we can get ready for class in here." Sakura said proudly. "That way nobody has to have any embarrassing moments."

"Any MORE embarrassing moments." Sasuke corrected from the floor.


	5. Girl Talk

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 5. Girl Talk.**

Sasuke stepped out of the bathroom with Naruto. The girls were all gone now and Naruto had just finished stuffing toilet paper up his nostrils.

"I'm beginning to like this mission." Naruto said grinning.

"You're such a pervert. You're starting to act like Kakashi." Sasuke said in disgust.

This punched Naruto's outrage button and he immediately jumped up in Sasuke's face. "You're one to talk, you were staring at my rear the entire time we were showering."

"I was not." Sasuke said with irritation. "You were the one who kept trying to bump into me."

The two glared at each other for a moment, but let it drop. The simply truth of the matter had been that they'd BOTH been eyeing Kimi while she showered. The two of them let their thoughts drift back to the scene and Naruto grabbed more tissue.

Naruto finally finished drying his terribly long hair and passed the dryer to Sasuke, who in his male oriented world had forgotten several basic tools for being a young teenage girl. Sasuke quickly finished his hair and the two of them set off for their room. Naruto in a t-shirt and shorts, and Sasuke in his knee length nightshirt that he had just now realized with horror had unicorns all over it. He secretly resented the fact that he hadn't realized that a t-shirt and boxer shorts were perfectly acceptable sleepwear for girls as long as the boxer shorts looked ridiculous.

As they left the bathroom, Sasuke watched as Naruto put on some sort of ridiculous black and white nightcap.

"Naruto, don't you think you're going a bit far with the wardrobe?" Sasuke said irritably.

"What? My shorts don't have THAT many hearts on them." Naruto said defensively.

"I was referring to the nightcap." Sasuke said as patiently as he could manage.

"What are you talking about? I always wear a nightcap at home, and this one happens to be my favorite." Naruto said peevishly.

"Naruto, you're probably the only person in the world who wears anything that stupid." Sasuke said as they reached their dorm room door. There they found several of the girls standing around, many of whom were sadly wearing nightcaps. Sasuke groaned as he realized Hinata had one too that was identical to Naruto's.

Sasuke just sighed in defeat as he realized it must be a girl thing and secretly decided to stay a little bit further away from Naruto. It did explain however how Naruto was managing to annoy him to levels that normally only other girls were capable of. Sasuke shuddered as he realized he'd started thinking of Naruto as a girl.

"Hey, Shiori." Sakura said as the two arrived. "All the girls are coming in for a little visit."

Sasuke glanced at Naruto as both of them felt their heart sink clear into their shorts, well panties. "Fine, whatever." Sasuke said as he rushed past them to open the door. He opened the door to stare at Kakashi sitting in the middle of his floor.

Sasuke panicked and turned to stop anyone from coming in, but it was too late. Nariko and Yoshiko were already coming in behind him. The two girls had eyes as big as saucers as Sasuke struggled for a believable lie.

"No, wait. I can explain…" Sasuke said desperately.

"Jun'ko is going to have a cow if she finds out about this Shiori." Yoshiko said seriously.

"I don't care!" Nariko said gleefully. "He's so adorable! Can I hold him?"

Nariko brushed past Sasuke into the room. Sasuke turned back around to find a silver haired kitten sitting in the middle of the floor. Nariko ran over and grabbed up the kitten as fast as she could.

_Thank Kami-sama for replacement jutsu._ Sasuke thought earnestly.

Nariko cradled the little kitten hugging it close to her and the kitten proceeded to try to bury it's head into her breasts, rubbing up against the girl and purring loud enough to wake the dead.

_OK, maybe it isn't a replacement jutsu._ Sasuke thought in disgust.

The rest of the girls came in and Hinata was exchanging confused glances with Sasuke. "I'll tell you later." Sasuke silently mouthed to her.

All the girls sat down in a circle in the floor and Sasuke took a seat between Hinata and Naruto. He normally wouldn't have deprived Hinata of the chance to sit next to Naruto, but otherwise he would have had to take a seat next to Sakura, and she acted too weird even if he WAS looking like a girl. This thought disturbed him nearly as bad as starting to think of Naruto as a girl.

"So where are you girls from?" Kimi was saying.

"We're all from a place called Konoha." Sakura answered for them.

"I've never heard of it. What do your fathers do there?" Kimi asked intrigued.

"My father has a position in the government there." Sakura said proudly. Sasuke honestly didn't know exactly WHAT Sakura's parents did, but if she were lying then she was a pretty good actress.

"My father is a wealthy and powerful member of the community there too." Hinata said quietly.

The rest of the girls nodded and looked at Naruto and Sasuke expectantly.

"I'm an orphan." Naruto said miserably.

"Me too." Sasuke said quietly. He hated being grouped with Naruto in just about anything, but this time it couldn't be helped.

"How are you two attending here then?" Kimi asked suspiciously. "The tuition is pretty high."

"My teacher arranged for me to come." Naruto said honestly. "He thought that it might make me better… person."

Sasuke had to admit the dope had managed a believable story. He was just about to use the same one when Sakura piped up.

"Shiori is the last of a powerful and wealthy family in Konoha as well." Sakura said proudly.

Sasuke shot daggers at Sakura from his eyes, but didn't say anything. Fortunately their stories seemed to convince Kimi.

"I guess that means you have a lot of suitors, eh Shiori." Kimi said knowingly.

"Yeah, actually." Sasuke said truthfully. Then, he couldn't resist tossing a barb at Sakura. "All of them are pretty annoying though. I wish they'd just leave me alone."

This seemed to deflate Sakura a little, and Naruto looked ready to jump him if he hadn't been in a room of other girls.

"Yeah, boys can be pretty annoying sometimes." Kimi said sagely. Sasuke just smirked. _And girls aren't?_

"Me personally, I find it best to go find a friend that I can rely on and then I have him pose as my boyfriend. That generally keeps most of the less serious crushes away." Kimi said jokingly.

Sasuke stared at Kimi for a moment. She was pretty attractive, not that Sasuke thought he wasn't after all; she might have to deal with similar numbers as himself when it came to members of the opposite sex.

Sasuke caught himself glancing at Sakura. She hadn't looked up after his comments about wanting to be left alone. _Who knows, it might work._

"I'll have to keep that in mind." Sasuke said finally.

"How about you Hinata? Any boy problems?" Kimi asked.

Hinata nearly fainted. She looked over at Naruto timidly. Naruto was naturally oblivious as he ran a brush through his long blonde hair.

"What are you looking at Naniko for, Hinata? You're not gay are you?" Kimi asked leering at the poor girl.

Sasuke decided to come to the girl's rescue before she really did pass out. "Hinata is in love with Naniko's cousin. Uzumaki Naruto." Sasuke said simply.

"Gone again." Sakura said clinically as Hinata's eyes rolled back into her head and she fell backwards. Fortunately, she'd already been sitting.

"What?" Naruto asked incredulously. "Hinata, wake up! Come on, is that true?"

Naruto moved over and was trying to wake up Hinata. Hinata however looked down for the count. Meanwhile, the little silver haired kitten had been being passed around and had pretty effectively gotten a face full of just about every bust in the room. Sakura held out the kitten to Sasuke who just looked at it. "Sorry, don't like cats. You keep him."

Sakura set the cat down in her lap and it curled up into the warmth of her lap and looked like it was in seventh heaven.

"What about you, Sakura?" Kimi asked.

"Oh, I don't know." Sakura said, quietly blushing.

"Oh, please." Naruto said exasperated, finally giving up on waking up Hinata. "You're always 'Sasuke this…' and 'Sasuke that…'" Naruto said peevishly. "You need to give up on that loser."

Sasuke tried to keep from killing Naruto on the spot, when Sakura retorted. "Sasuke is not a loser! He's the strongest, most beautiful man I know." Sakura said heatedly.

Kimi watched the exchange with glee. Apparently, she was into soap operas. "I guess you have got it bad for this 'Sasuke'. So have you told him how you feel?"

Sakura shot a quick unnoticeable glance in Sasuke's direction before responding. "It's not like it hasn't been obvious. I'm always asking him out, but he doesn't even act like I exist."

"Sounds to me like he's gay." Kimi said finally. Sasuke looked up quickly at the other girls who were apparently nodding sagely.

"I'm sure he's not gay." Sasuke said in his own defense.

"How do you know? Have you ever seen him kiss a girl?" Kimi asked.

"I did see him kiss YOU one time." Sakura said glaring at Naruto.

"It was an accident, I swear!" Naruto said in a panic. Then he looked at Sasuke and grinned. _Oh no, Naruto. Please don't._ "Besides, I'm pretty sure Sasuke MUST be gay if he isn't returning your affections Sakura."

Sasuke vowed to destroy Naruto. Just as soon as his brother was dead he was going to bury Naruto next to him.

"So Shiori, have YOU ever kissed a guy?" Kimi said enthusiastically.

"You kissed Naruto." Hinata said sadly. Sasuke turned to find the girl had recovered and was sitting up. She looked crestfallen, and Sasuke felt sorry for her.

"Don't worry, Hinata. HE kissed ME. I can assure you that you have nothing to worry about from me. In fact, you're ably the only girl that would have him." Sasuke said looking back at Naruto and grinning.

Naruto was effectively ready to kill Sasuke, and obviously wanted to talk to Hinata. Sasuke decided to leave it at that; he was above getting into shouting matches with Naruto.

"So, Naniko. You think you might be able to fix up Hinata with your cousin Naruto?" Kimi asked finally.

Naruto looked like he'd been struck square in the face. Sasuke knew the look well, since he'd put that look there enough times. "I don't know." Naruto said getting more serious than Sasuke had ever seen him. "I never gave it any thought before now."

"Are the two of you close?" Takara asked.

"You could say we're inseparable." Naruto said vaguely.

The rest of the evening was spent with the four young ninjas interrogating the girls. Kimi was a stuck up rich girl who tried to be the best at everything. Sasuke already didn't like her. Nariko was a gentle girl a lot like Hinata, whose father was a low level bureaucrat. The two hit it off immediately and Sasuke figured that Hinata was probably going to have a pen pal after the mission was over. Yoshiko's father was one of the wealthiest men in the oil industry. She didn't get to see him much as she pretty much spent her life surrounded by servants and tutors before coming here. Takara's father held a mid-level post within the government, which she knew very little of, except that he was some sort of ambassadorial liaison.

The girls finally left to return to their rooms. After they left, Naruto turned around to look at the kitten. "So who brought the cat?"

A puff of smoke filled the room and after it cleared, Kakashi was sitting once again in the middle of the floor. Naruto and Sakura immediately clamped their arms over their breasts. "You pervert!" They cried in unison.

"Now, now." Kakashi said placating the two. "I didn't have a choice."

"Yeah, right." Naruto said obviously offended. "You purred the entire time you were here."

"I just came by to let you know that Kurenai and the boys are settled into the boys school across the lake. I've made camp near here and I'll be watching you throughout the day." Kakashi said simply. "I was going to suggest that the four of you get down to the business of investigating these girls to see if you could determine the assassin's target. So… what do you think?"

"I think we can rule out Nariko or Kimi. Their fathers aren't really important enough to rate having somebody try to use their daughters against them for leverage." Sakura said seriously.

"We also don't have very much information on Takara's father. She doesn't know what he does, but it is associated with the military. Can we get somebody on the outside to check on him?" Hinata said quietly.

"Wow, you guys got all that?" Naruto said, impressed at their perception.

"All you had to do was listen dope instead of brushing your hair." Sasuke said acidly. He thought Naruto was WAY to comfortable as a girl.

"We'll see what we can find out about him. In the meantime, you three keep your eyes peeled. Tomorrow you'll be introduced to some of the faculty. Keep your eyes open for anything that seems out of the ordinary." Kakashi said quietly as he got up to head out the window.

"Also, I want the two of you to pay attention during your classes." Kakashi said gesturing to Naruto and Sasuke.

"Why?" Naruto said confused.

"They two of you could learn a lot here on how to act like girls. Quite frankly the two of you stick out like a sore thumb to a trained professional. Try to learn how to BE a girl. The Hokage thinks this will be a good training exercise to teach you about being undercover. She even mentioned leaving you here until the end of the semester even if we catch the assassin." Kakashi said as he stepped out onto the ledge.

Sasuke watched Kakashi go and then looked at Sakura. He noticed Naruto staring at Hinata, and then they both glanced at each other. It was scary sometimes how they almost seemed to know what the other was thinking. They had a mission to complete. They'd have to deal with the girls after they had completed the job at hand. Besides, he and Naruto were going to have a lot on their minds, and making nay long term decisions about their relationship with the girls was going to have to wait.

"Good night Sakura." Sasuke said climbing into bed.

"Good night Hinata." Naruto said as he did the same.

"Good night." The girls echoed and the four of them settled into prepare themselves for the coming day.


	6. The Arts

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 6. The Arts.**

"This is an awfully strange schedule." Naruto said looking down at their list of classes.

"The guidance counselor said that classes are set up a little differently here. We have three classes during the day; each lasting two hours. We have a half hour break between each class, and a half hour for lunch." Sakura said handing out copies of the class schedules.

"So what's our first class?" Sasuke said in his usual monotone.

"'The Arts'. Sakura said glancing at the schedule. According to the guidance counselor, this class deals with dancing, singing, etiquette, and nearly everything else that a young girl needs to fit into polite society." Sakura said as she looked over the course description.

"Joy." Naruto and Sasuke said blandly.

The four young ninjas proceeded to the music building in order to find the drill hall they were assigned too. The eventually found the room where they discovered a withered old crone standing at the door with a long cane that came up to her chest. She had on a long black dress that looked like it belonged in an antique store, and from the look of her it was probably new when she bought it.

"Into the dressing room girls. Don't dawdle." She commanded.

"Good morning class, my name is Madame Furucho Marise. I will be your teacher in etiquette and the arts." Madame Furucho said, surveying the class. For the most part they were the typical lot of brainless young girls that needed to be transformed into brilliant young ladies.

The class lined up around the dance hall that served as their classroom in their ballet outfits and stood at attention. Madame Furucho walked around them observing them and taking notes on their appearance and their posture.

"Great. Now I'm in a tutu." Said one particularly pretty raven-haired girl to herself as she passed by.

"Is there something you would like to share with the rest of the class, Ms. Uchiha?" Madame Furucho said swatting the girl across the rump with the long cane that would come to be known by Naruto as the Sasuke-be-good stick.

"No ma'am."

"I prefer to always be addressed as Madame Furucho."

"No Madame Furucho."

Madame Furucho snorted and continued to examine the class. "Some of you have potential, some of you look to be hopeless. During the course of this year, I will be trying to make young ladies out of you by teaching you grace, poise, and artistic ability. However talented some of you may be, it will not serve as a substitute for proper training in dance, voice, or etiquette. Some of you obviously have no talent." Madame Furucho said swatting a blonde girl who had gone to sleep standing up. "But it will be overcome with proper training. It is my intention to display your skills at this year's ball that will be held at the end of the semester. There you will be displaying your new social graces as well as your artistic ability in the manner of your choosing. Likewise, the young gentlemen from Lakeview will be there to display what passes for polite behavior from the grunting half of the species."

Most of the girls laughed. Madame Furucho did not think it was very funny. "If you remember nothing else from this class, remember this." Madame Furucho said as music began to filter through the dance hall.

_You… must…walk feminine,_

_Talk feminine,_

_Smile and beguile feminine,_

_Utilize your femininity,_

_That's what every girl should know,_

_If she wants to catch a beau,_

_Dance feminine,_

_Glance feminine,_

_Act shy and sigh feminine,_

_Compliment his masculinity,_

_That's what every girl should know,_

_If she wants to catch a beau,_

_Let him do the talking,_

_Men adore good listeners,_

_Laugh, but not loudly ha-ha,_

_If he should chose to tell a joke,_

_Be radiant, but delicate,_

_Memorize the rules of etiquette,_

_Be demure,_

_Sweet and pure,_

_HIDE the real you,_

_You must look feminine,_

_Dress feminine,_

_You're at your BEST feminine,_

_Emphasize your femininity,_

_That's what every girl should know,_

_Femininity, FEMININITY,_

_THAT'S the way to catch a beau._

(**A/N:** The song _Femininity_ is from the 1963 Disney film _Summer Magic_, and should you wish to listen to it, it's on Classic Disney Volume 5, Track 15. Not that I listen to that stuff or anything, cough)

Sasuke watched as Madame Furucho launched into the la-de-da portion of her song as she danced gracefully around the room. She was a withered old gray haired woman who looked like she had a permanent scowl etched on her face, but she sang quite beautifully. He stood there for a moment before turning to Naruto. "What just happened?"

Naruto had a vacant expression on his face. "I think they call it a musical number."

"I didn't realize we signed on for a musical." Sasuke said sadly.

"This place just keeps getting weirder and weirder. I don't know if we're going to make it through this one or not." Naruto said seriously.

Sasuke looked over at Hinata and Sakura who were looking at he and Naruto thoughtfully. _Oh, crap…_

Madame Furucho finally seemed to come to her senses and ended her song as the music died straightening her dress ad putting stray locks back in place on her tightly woven bun.

"So, do any of you girls play an instrument?" She asked.

No one raised their hand until slowly Sakura raised hers uncertainly. "Yes, Madame Furucho. I play the piano." Sakura then noticed the others staring at her. "What? My mom made me take lessons!"

"That's wonderful dear. You can work on your piano skills for the rest of the hour and I'll look forward to hearing you play at the ball. So does anyone else play an instrument?" Madame Furucho asked looking over the rest of the girls. "Very well then, we'll see what kind of voices you have."

Madame Furucho went down the line of girls testing their voices and having them sing small parts or nursery rhymes and occasionally singing a scale. Finally she came to the last three, which were Hinata, Naruto and Sasuke. "Alright child." Madame Furucho said as she walked behind Hinata. "Let's hear something."

Sasuke strained to hear what Hinata was singing, but couldn't hear her even though he was just a few feet away. Madame Furucho slammed her cane into the floor behind Hinata and the volume picked up considerably. Sasuke listened as Hinata sang the most beautiful lullaby he had ever heard.

Next to him, Naruto was ready to cry. "I wish I could have grown up with MY mother singing me to sleep like that. That was really beautiful Hinata-chan."

Madame Furucho had walked around to look at Hinata as she blushed and lowered her eyes. Madame Furucho reached out and lifted Hinata's chin so she could look down into her eyes. It almost looked like the woman was trying to smile under all the wrinkles.

"Yes, it was quite lovely child. You have a gift. Your voice is exceptional, with my training you can learn to be great." Madame Furucho said beaming. "I would like for you to work with Sakura. I think the two of you could combine your talents to make a superb performance at the ball."

Hinata looked ready to faint. "Do think I can?"

"Of course child. After all, it is often said that it is the wilting flowers that have the softest, and sweetest, fragrance." Madame Furucho said warmly.

She then turned to Naruto. "Alright Naniko. Let's hear your voice."

What followed afterward was absolutely stunning. Not in the sense that Hinata had been stunning, but in the sense that Sasuke was stunned from Naruto's attempt to sing. It sounded something like a brakes squealing on a runaway car slamming into a cat that was being strangled with an electric fence. Sasuke grabbed his ears, as did the rest of the class as one of the windows shattered, a dog howled, and somewhere a band of Benedictine monks was dispatched for the sole purpose of finding Uzumaki Naruto and baptizing him so they could put him under an oath of silence.

For her part, Madame Furucho didn't flinch, much. She merely shook herself for a moment and said, "We'll work on it."

Finally it was Sasuke's turn. He had no idea what they thought they were going to get out of him, but one thing was certain. Uchiha Sasuke was NOT going to sing.

"Let's hear you Shiori." Madame Furucho said primly.

"I don't sing." Sasuke said softly with a dangerous hint to his voice. It usually worked on Kakashi.

Sasuke felt the rap of the cane on the back of his head as Madame Furucho brought wrapped her cane around and then brought it up under Sasuke's chin. "When I'm done with you," Madame Furucho said in an even MORE dangerous tone, "you will."


	7. Home Economics

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 7. Home Economics.**

"But you have a really NICE voice Shiori." Naruto said still snickering.

"I don't want to talk about it." Sasuke was saying as he tried to sulk.

"Man, and that one note she made you hit. I don't think I could ever get that high." Naruto said smiling.

Sasuke took a look around the home economics room to make sure no one was listening. "If we ever get back to being male, I think I might have some fun making you try." Sasuke said with an evil glint in his eye.

Naruto tried not to think about that one too hard, which admittedly came natural to him.

All the girls once again lined up as the class welcomed Ms. Satunabe. Jun'ko entered, looked through the roster and then looked up at all of them. "OK, I'm sure you all enjoyed Madame Furucho's performance this morning, so is there anything before we begin?"

There was a moment when only blank stares and crickets answered Jun'ko before… "I'm hungry!" Naruto blurted.

"Later!" Jun'ko said with annoyance as she went back to looking over the class. "As Madame Furucho has most likely already explained to everyone, there will be a ball at the end of the semester. This ball is the culmination of your efforts here during your first year. This class is no exception. At the ball this year, you are going to be wearing your class project from this class. I will be splitting you up into pairs and the two of you will be working on your ball gowns together. Each of you will be making your own dress, with my assistance, and you partner will help you with the measuring, modeling and so forth as you shall also do for them."

"Oh, this does not bode well." Naruto said using the senses that main characters often acquire when something bad or comical was about to happen, usually both.

Ms. Satunabe went down the line assigning partners until she reached the last two unfortunate recipients of today's dose of bad news. "Sakura will team up with Hinata, and Shiori, you and Naniko will be partners as well."

Naruto tried to calm himself. He didn't know much about sewing, but he was pretty sure that it involved things like needles and pins. Needles and pins that would be in the hands of a certain Uchiha Sasuke while he Naruto was expected to stand still wearing bits of cloth over his pressure points that were probably going to look like targets. It wasn't that Naruto didn't trust Sasuke, necessarily, it was just that when you belong to a profession that spends its time hunting down people that like to stay in the shadows holding sharp pointy objects you tend to develop certain qualities. Those qualities being smart, being paranoid, and being dead, usually two out of the three and Naruto fully realized he was running behind in one of them.

Sasuke didn't seem thrilled either, but then Sasuke didn't seem thrilled about much most days.

"In this class students, we will be spending every day together directly before lunch learning things such as sewing, needlepoint, knitting, cooking, and decorating. As such, as is the custom I have with all my classes before lunch, we will be eating together here in this room. These same pairs will be responsible for making the lunch for the rest of the class during this period on their assigned day." Jun'ko quickly went down the list of partners. "Shiori, you and Naniko, will be responsible for lunch every Friday."

"Cool!" Naruto said in anticipation. "Ramen every Friday!"

Naruto didn't think it was a bad idea, but suddenly Sasuke was doubled over holding his stomach. He quickly raised his hand. "Ms. Satunabe? Can I please be excused to go see the nurse?"

Naruto looked over at him when he felt the sensation. He was running out of chakra. Naruto quickly raised his hand. "Yeah, Ms. Satunabe. I can help Shiori there."

Jun'ko looked annoyed, but nodded. Naruto thought she heard her mutter something about first year students and then set about getting the girls set into doing needlepoint.

Sasuke and Naruto closed the door behind them and then looked up and down the hall. "Over here!" Naruto shouted as the two of them ran for the nearest room.

The two ducked inside and quickly made sure they were alone before the reached under their skirts and jerked down their panties. Just in time too, as the two boys suddenly welcomed back some long lost friends.

"Man that was close." Sasuke said looking unsuccessfully for a pocket on his school uniform in which to deposit his underwear.

"Yeah, I nearly ripped my favorite pair of panties." Naruto said sighing.

"I was referring to nearly getting caught dope." Sasuke said quietly.

"Oh. So how long did we manage?" Naruto asked trying to remember.

"Six days. I think we need to take the time and rest on weekends so we don't have little accidents like this again." Sasuke said seriously. "So now what do we do?"

"What else, we skip class." Naruto said simply.

"We can't do that." Sasuke said coldly.

"Sure we can. You're talking to an old pro here. We'll find someplace to hide out and rest long enough to recover our chakra to make it through the rest of the day. Besides, you haven't already become that fond of needlepoint have you?" Naruto said smiling.

Say what you will, there are some things that Uzumaki Naruto was bloody well good at. You had to be BLOODY brilliant to skip class at a ninja academy where the primary focus was on stealth, spying, and searching. Sasuke apparently realized this so he nodded and looked around the room.

The two now obvious boys in drag found themselves in a storage room with a lot of lawn equipment. They searched around until they found their prize, two pairs of coveralls. The two quickly put on the oversized garments over their uniforms and stuffed the panties in the pockets.

"Now what?" Sasuke asked the resident delinquent in charge.

"There's a door over here that leads outside. Let's get out of the building and see if we can slip across the campus to the dorms. We'll ditch the coveralls and hang out there until our next class. We should be able to stay transformed for the rest of the day by then." Naruto said looking out.

They two boys slipped out the door and started walking around and tried to look busy as they tried to make their way towards the dorms. They only got about half way before a woman's voice caught their attention. "Excuse me boys, could I have a word with you?"

Naruto and Sasuke turned around to find a middle-aged woman staring down at them reproachfully. "I suggest that the explanation you are about to give be EXCEPTIONALLY good." She said tapping her foot.

"We were just about to go plant some flowers Miss…" Naruto started.

"Tanako Chiko. And no you weren't. You were headed over towards those dorms over there." Ms. Tanako said looking past them towards the dorms that the two of them were staying in. "Honestly boys, do you think that an all _girls_ school is going to hire custodians who are young _boys_ that know every bush on the property?"

"Great idea, dope." Sasuke said sarcastically.

Naruto looked up and his brain froze. Most of his ninja training had been centered on stealth, but it usually ended situations like this with sticking it to the other guy before he stuck you. Obviously he was unprepared for the eventuality that sticking people might not be appropriate and that the other person might in fact not even be a guy.

Finally, much to Naruto's chagrin it was once again Sasuke who saved him. Sasuke looked down and started dragging his foot in front of him with his hands behind his back looking ashamed. "I'm sorry ma'am. We just wanted to see our girlfriends."

There were two things Naruto was fairly certain of about Sasuke in his short time with him. One, Sasuke never looked like he was ashamed of anything, and two, Sasuke didn't do 'sorry'.

Naruto quickly realized this and adopted a similar posture. "We've just been missing them since they left home is all." Naruto said miserably.

"So who are these girlfriends of yours?" Ms Tanako said severely.

"Haruno Sakura." Sasuke said with his eyes down cast.

Naruto nearly swore. He would have to take Sakura. Then the words from the previous night started echoing in his brain. _Hinata is in love with Uzumaki Naruto._ Naruto hadn't really had a chance to talk to her about it yet either.

"And you?" Ms. Tanako demanded.

"Hyuuga Hinata." Naruto said meekly. _Forgive me, Sakura._

"Very well then. You two come with me. I believe those two are in Ms. Satunabe's class." Ms. Tanako turned and the two boys marched after her into the aforementioned building from which they had just escaped.

She marched them down the hall to their classroom and then knocked on the door. Shortly thereafter, Jun'ko answered looking from her to the two boys. "We've got some more." Ms. Tanako said simply. "Could you bring out Sakura and Hinata?"

Jun'ko smirked and then stepped back inside a few minutes later, Sakura and Hinata appeared in the doorway followed by the rest of the class full of girls who prescribed to the philosophy of 'Ooh look, somebody's going to get it, let's go watch'.

The look on Sakura and Hinata's faces was a quaint mixture of terror and recognition. Naruto had to admit, that it was pretty easy for them to stay in character.

"Never mind." Ms. Tanako said nodding. "I can already tell these two must belong to you. Girls, I cannot impress upon you enough just how grave this situation is. If it was up to me, and you belonged in my dorm, I would be packing you off for home immediately. You girls simply CANNOT be receiving visits from your boyfriends here at the school." Ms. Tanako said primly.

Sakura's mouth was moving, but her voice had refused to function. She looked somewhat like a floundering fish out of water. Granted, she was a _pretty, pink-haired_ fish out of water, but a fish nonetheless.

"Oh, take the cork out, Chiko." Jun'ko said smiling in a motherly type way that told Naruto's sense of delinquency he was about to get away with something. "It's not like they're the first. At least you didn't catch them in bed together."

Now Sasuke's mouth wasn't quite working properly, Naruto had a nosebleed, and Hinata was out like light.

"We REALLY need to do something about that." Sakura was saying, as she was the first to recover.

"Well, they belong to your dorm, so handle it how you see fit." Ms. Tanako was saying. "I know I'd never let _my_ boys act like that. I enrolled them across the lake so they'd learn to be PROPER gentlemen."

"Yes, you've told us a dozen times already, I'm sure you're proud. I'll take it from here." Jun'ko said. "You girls get back to your needlework."

Hinata had gotten up and Sakura was helping her. The two turned to go back in. "Not you two." Jun'ko said quickly.

Ms. Tanako huffed and left them with Jun'ko and headed off to do whatever it is fussy women go about doing when they aren't griping at other people. Practice, was Naruto's humble opinion.

"Well, take those coveralls off then. They don't really fit the two of you." Jun'ko said smiling to herself. She apparently had seen this plenty of times before enough to think of it as amusing.

"We can't." Naruto said blushing.

"Why not?" Jun'ko demanded loosing some of her previous amusement.

"It was hot so we took off our clothes and stashed them outside the gate." Sasuke supplied.

"Very well then, come along all of you." Jun'ko said regaining some of her amusement. Naruto guessed that sometimes it was amusing to have funny things happen to _other_ people so that it busted up the tedium of the day.

Jun'ko escorted them across the grounds along with Hinata and Sakura until they reached the gate. She then opened it and looked at the four of them before smiling. "Oh, don't let Tanako bother you. She's new and still has the idea that rules are rules. Is this where your clothes are?"

Sasuke nodded. Naruto sighed; freedom was just a few feet away.

"Well, I'll stay right here and you boys can go change your clothes and bring the coveralls back to me here. I trust you two can find your ways back home without any help?" Jun'ko asked.

Sasuke and Naruto nodded emphatically.

"Good. You know girls," Jun'ko said looking to Hinata and Sakura, "I'd be flattered. A boy has to love girl pretty much to risk getting caught to come here just to see them." There were blushes all around at that one. "The late Mr. Satunabe pulled a similar stunt when I was a girl your age."

"You know it's a shame you boys came all this way and tried so hard just to leave empty handed. I tell you what. I'll step over here out of earshot and you boys can say your good byes and at least get a good-bye kiss for your efforts." Jun'ko said smiling and leaving the four for a little distance so she could watch and make sure no impropriety happened while still giving them a measure of privacy.

The blushes had now been replaced by four sets of eyes that were now as big as saucers as Sakura's hand reached out to grab Hinata's arm, just in case.

"I guess we better make this believable." Sakura said hopefully as Sasuke took her hands.

"Yeah." Sasuke said looking nervous. "Uh, Sakura."

"Yes, Sasuke?" Sakura said looking at his lips in anticipation. _She's actually ENJOYING this._ Sasuke thought bitterly.

"I've never kissed a girl before. I know I kissed Naruto, but that doesn't count." Sasuke said nervously.

"I know." Sakura said breathlessly.

"So, how do we do this?" Sasuke asked dumbly. Ignorance was NOT something he liked confessing.

Sakura seemed to snap out of her dream state for a moment. "What do you mean?"

"What I mean is, that I never really thought about how to kiss a girl before and make it look romantic. You're a girl and apparently you've been dreaming about this for a while, so what do I do now?" Sasuke said desperately. Hopefully Jun'ko was going to believe it was a long good bye.

"You know I never actually imagined I'd get to this part." Sakura said seriously putting her hands up on his shoulders. "Well, I guess you need to start by putting your hands on my hips."

"Like this?"

"Yeah." Sakura said apparently finding it slightly difficult to breathe. "Now slowly reach your hands around to the small of my back while you pull me into you."

"Like this?" Sasuke said as he did as he was instructed. Sakura was leaning forward and now had her weight against his chest and would have fallen if not for him holding her up.

"That's actually a little low, but I'm not complaining." Sakura said in a whisper as her face was now very close to his.

"Now what do we do?" Sasuke asked whispering just as low.

Sakura's head tilted to the side, as she got closer. "We just… do what… comes naturally." Sakura said as she reached up and claimed his lips with her own.

Strawberry. From that day forward, Sasuke would remember that it tasted like strawberry. He remembered it, because when Sakura had been teaching him how to apply makeup, she had given him lip-gloss that had tasted like strawberries. He had mentioned that he liked the taste, so that's what she was wearing now. _She must really have it bad._ Sasuke thought to himself.

The next thing he would always remember was when her tongue invaded his mouth. He wasn't expecting it and nearly pulled back, but managed to keep his wits. Jumping back from a kiss from your girlfriend would probably cause some questions from Jun'ko. Yeah questions, that was the reason.

Naruto had his back to Sakura and Sasuke. He really didn't want to think about that right now. Yeah, Hinata was pretty and sweet, and she would probably make a REALLY good girlfriend, but Naruto had honestly had feelings for Sakura. He tried not to think too closely about thinking about them in the past tense and succeeded. He was good at that.

Hinata on the other hand, he knew he cared for. He had simply never seen her as anything but the kind, caring, nurturing, person who was always in his shadow trying to be a quiet encouragement and trying to make him feel good while everybody else in the village spat on him. _Yeah, I guess I AM a dope._ Naruto thought in retrospect. It was just that he hadn't even realized Hinata's true feeling for him for more than twenty-four hours and here they were about to have their first kiss.

To give Naruto credit, he really didn't need as much help as Sasuke when it came to kissing a girl romantically. He'd fantasized about this off and on for as long as he could remember liking Sakura. Now all he had to do was replace Sakura with Hinata in his visions and he had some pretty good ideas about how to go about things.

"Hinata?" Naruto ventured.

"Yes, Naruto-kun." Hinata said blushing. She was sweet that way.

"What Sasuke said last night, is it true?" Naruto said quietly. He too had taken Hinata's hands.

"Yes." Came Hinata's reply almost sounding ashamed.

"What's wrong?"

"I'm sorry I never had the courage to tell you before now, Naruto-kun." Hinata said sadly.

"No Hinata. You have nothing to be sorry for. I'm just sorry I never realized it before now." Naruto said honestly.

"It's alright." Hinata said seriously.

"Hinata, you know me pretty well, so I'm just going to say this. You know that I've always had this thing for Sakura." Naruto said.

Hinata nodded lowering her eyes to her feet.

"But that doesn't mean that I don't care for you too." Naruto said dumbly. He reached out and lifted Hinata's chin to look in her eyes. "You've always been there for me and I've been to dense to see it. I'm sorry for that. All that I CAN promise you that I'm not going to ignore that any more. Hinata, I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow or the next day any more than anybody else, but what I do know is that I'm going to take every opportunity I have to see if there might be something between us. That is if you still want me."

Hinata didn't say anything. She didn't have to. The smile on her face spoke volumes. Naruto resolved within himself that no matter what happened, he was going to try and make sure she smiled like that more often.

Naruto moved towards Hinata much as Sakura and Sasuke were doing behind him. He too had his hands a little too low as he reached around her, and she too wasn't complaining. In fact, she shifted so that his hands actually dropped a little lower.

Naruto leaned in and took Hinata's lips with his own. He knew she was shy, and wanting this to be a special moment for her gently invaded her mouth with his tongue. He did after all, have the most perverted sensei in Konoha so advice on proper kissing was always available. They kissed for a moment, and then when Naruto went to move away he felt Hinata's gentle hands cup his face and the next thing HE knew he was leaning into HER trying desperately to gasp for air as she dove in madly to his kiss.

In retrospect he shouldn't have been surprised. He'd pretty much imagined that it would have been his reaction as well if he'd ever gotten the shot to kiss Sakura. He'd thought that in case he might not ever get a second shot. That was when he reached two decisions. First a ninja led a dangerous lifestyle, so make every kiss count like it was your last one.

(A/N: A bit of kindly advice I would give to all who read this story. We may not have as dangerous of a lifestyle, but life is short none-the-less.)

Secondly, he decided Hinata was DEFINTELY getting another shot, along with, more than likely, a third, fourth, fifth, sixth, etc.

Jun'ko watched the young lovers for a moment and let the memory take her back. Then she waited. Then she waited some more. The she cleared her throat. Then she wondered if they needed to breathe. Then she cleared her throat. Then she went over and tapped the two boys on the shoulder. Then she decided this whole romantic thing had gone on for quite long enough and whacked both boys upside the head. She did however smile afterwards.

Sasuke walked toward the bushes with Naruto in tow. He really hadn't thought this far ahead with his lie, but since they were out they could always just run for it.

"You call that believable?" Sasuke said baiting Naruto.

"What? I lasted longer than you did!" Naruto retorted.

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Bet me."

"You're on!" Naruto said in defiance as they ducked into the bushes. "Though we might want to clear that type of contest with the girls."

"I don't think they'll mind." Sasuke said seriously. "I didn't think that she was going to stand there and wait until we brought the coveralls back."

"Maybe I can assist with that."

"Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto said managing to yell while whispering.

"Here give me the coveralls. I'll do an illusion of Sasuke and carry them back to her. Nice kisses by the way." Kakashi said admiringly.

Both boys were blushing as they took off their coveralls. "You saw us?"

"Saw, heard, and what's more, got pictures." Kakashi said holding up some photos of the young lovers kissing.

"You wouldn't dare!" Sasuke said as he handed the coveralls to Kakashi. Kakashi didn't say a word, but had a feral gleam in his eye that said that he not only would dare, but also HAD dared, and most likely would dare AGAIN if given the opportunity.

Naruto still had a distant look in his eyes. "Uh sensei? Why did you bring a camera on this mission?"

Ayame and Suzu went into the storage room. They were in detention for sneaking out after dark and had been assigned to flower duty. The two of them looked around until they found the coveralls that were kept for just such a purpose and slipped into them. Ayame reached into a pocket and pulled out something lacey. She looked at it for a moment before turning to Suzu. "Is this yours?"


	8. Soccer Practice

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 8. Soccer Practice.**

"Man, this sucks. Junky liked us better as boys." Naruto was complaining as they waited on the field for the soccer coach. They each had on soccer uniforms, which made Naruto and Sasuke happy for some reason. Sakura chalked it up to having a more manly appearance. "She gave me and Sasuke three days detention for skipping class."

_I wonder WHY she liked you better as boys?_ Sakura thought sarcastically glancing at Naruto and Sasuke. She hated to admit it in Naruto's case, but he and Sasuke were both rather handsome young men. She had gotten some pretty interesting jealous glares, and so had Hinata for that matter. Hinata however had been, and for that matter still was still a little lost. She stared with longing eyes back towards the gate where they had said 'good-bye' to Sasuke and Naruto.

Sakura also hated to admit that in a way it was good-bye. They were on a mission. They had a job to do, and if they started fawning over Sasuke and Naruto, they'd never get it done. Sakura resolved to have a long talk with Hinata once they were alone. She still had stars in her eyes from finally realizing her life long dream of opening up to Naruto. Admittedly, Sakura did too, but in all honesty she'd been around the real Uchiha Sasuke enough to let that cool her enthusiasm.

He could be an egotistical pain. He was rude, and quite often would say things just to make her angry. OK, and she also loved him for it. However, she hoped that the time she'd spent with Sasuke as a teammate had prepared her for the idea of a REAL relationship with him instead of just some sort of childish crush.

After a moment, something Naruto had said sunk in and her brain started working. "Did you say you have detention?"

"Yeah, not the first time I must say. What of it?" Naruto said testily.

"Are you going to be able to make it through detention this afternoon until you can get back to the room and rest?" Sakura asked seriously.

"I think so. We're only going to be there for a couple of hours. We're probably not going to be supervised either, so we'll be able to rest a little if we have to." Naruto said knowingly.

"Not supervised? Why not?" Sakura asked. She admittedly had never had detention in her life, where as they'd retired Naruto's desk at the ninja academy. Well, more like threw it away and replaced it since they didn't have to worry about Naruto carving anything in it anymore.

"Detention is supposed to be punishment for the student, not the teacher. They've got things to do just like the rest of us. We're actually going to use it to our advantage." Naruto said impressed with his own ingenuity.

"How exactly?" Sakura asked getting vaguely worried.

"Sasuke's going to sneak out and spy on the teachers while I stay behind. If a teacher walks in they'll see one of my shadow clones and me imitating Shiori." Naruto said happily.

"Thought of that yourself did you?" Sakura said impressed.

"Actually, Kakashi suggested it." Sasuke said quietly.

Shiori and Naniko were about to have a real good catfight when a whistle blew and all the girls lined up in front of the coach. The woman was tall and muscular and would have been a real good candidate to be kunoichi. She walked up and looked over the girls.

"Hello girls. My name is Coach Takamori Shika, but you will refer to me simply as 'Coach'. I'll be trying to keep you girls physically fit while you're here. We do this by playing soccer. Some of you girls are obviously in good shape, but a little more exercise never hurts. You have undoubtedly heard of the big ball at the end of the semester where each class you take has something to do with the ball. Well, this class has absolutely nothing to do with any ball other than this one." The coach said as she held up a soccer ball.

Naruto and Sasuke cheered.

"However, this class does have something that you girls are going to be preparing for, namely soccer tryouts and the game season this semester in which we will be competing against other schools for the Girl's Soccer Regional Trophy." Coach said looking over her class.

The rest of the girls groaned. Actually all the girls groaned except for Kimi, who apparently played back home.

Sakura watched as Kimi was bouncing a soccer ball from knee to knee. Her heart then start sinking as she realized that Naruto and Sasuke had gotten into a dribbling contest to see who could dribble the fastest. Neither of them were using their hands either. _You two! We're supposed to be normal girls, not highly trained ninjas!_ Sakura thought angrily.

Apparently this stunt hadn't been lost on the coach either as she watched them. "You two know how to play soccer?"

"Not really." Sasuke said as he slammed the ball down and started dribbling it on his head, again without hands. Not to be outdone, Naruto looked like he was going to do the same only using more imaginative parts of the anatomy.

"Uh, why don't you go out and try being the goalie, Naniko." Coach said watching the three. "Kimi, you and Shiori try to kick the ball into the net behind Shiori."

The three 'girls' went out to take their places. Kimi and Shiori had already started into it. "I was the best on my team," Kimi said bragging, "stick around and I'll show you a few things."

"Like how to loose?" Shiori said with a snicker.

Sakura was holding her head in her hands. This was not going to end well, these two had too much testosterone and being girls, oddly, just seemed to add to the problem. Shiori and Kimi each kicked a ball toward Naruto who easily dodged.

"Naniko! What are you doing?" Sakura asked sadly.

"Not getting hit." Came back the customary smart mouthed answer.

"You're supposed to block the balls and not let them get into the goal!" Sakura yelled.

"You know how to play?" Coach asked.

"No, I just glanced at the rule book." Sakura admitted.

Coach handed her a clipboard. "Here you can be the team manager. Your legs don't look like they were made for soccer."

Sakura boiled on the inside for a moment. _Translation: I don't walk around on tree trunks for kicking or lithe little nimble legs for running._ Sakura was pretty steamed. She or Hinata either one could easily best any of the other girls on the team except for Naruto or Sasuke due to their training. It was just that SOME people knew how to act undercover. Besides, her legs were fairly lean and sexy.

The coach turned around and looked back at the girls. "Here, let's stir things up a bit. Nariko, Hinata you two roll the balls to Shiori and Kimi and let's see how well Naniko does." The coach threw the ball at Hinata. Unfortunately, Hinata was still a little spaced out and got nailed in the forehead.

Hinata went down like a sack of potatoes. Girls gathered around her and tried to wake her up. The coach never really moved. Sakura just sighed at the amount of money the Hyuuga clan must spend on the laundry to get out all the grass stains.

"Is she all right?" The coach asked.

"She's out cold ma'am." Someone answered.

"Is she bleeding?"

"No, but she does have a pretty big red spot on her forehead. You want us to take her to the nurse?"

"No just leave her. She'll wake up eventually." Sakura got the impression that the coach was one of those people that would look at a fractured skull and say 'Suck it up'.

The girls started rolling balls and the coach started watching her clipboard. Sakura finally looked up to see Naruto in some sort of fighting stance breathing pretty hard. Sasuke and Kimi hadn't broken a sweat yet. It only took a moment for Sakura to deduce the problem.

"Naniko! USE YOUR HANDS STUPID!" Sakura shouted onto the field.

"I thought you told us not to." Naruto accused.

"The goalie can you idiot!" Sakura shrieked back. Naruto had been leaping, spinning, and bouncing back and forth to kick all the balls out of the air that were often kicked simultaneously at different ends of the goal. Not a single one had gotten past him.

The coach's eyes were glued as the contest intensified. Kimi and Sasuke were kicking balls as fast as they could, trying to be the first one to get a goal. Sakura inwardly hoped that she could come up with something to explain this.

"That was awesome!" The coach cried as the three of them stopped due to a lack of any more soccer balls more than anything else. "I've finally got something I can use! You three are going to be my star players!"

Sakura slapped her forehead in exasperation. _UNDERCOVER, PEOPLE!_

"You don't approve?" The coach asked looking down at Sakura.

"Oh no!" Sakura said looking around for some reason to have been slapping her forehead. "It's these plays. They're awfully old. We'll never win like this."

The look on the coach's face told Sakura that she had better choose her next words VERY carefully. "So you think you can do better? Show me."

Sakura looked down at the diagrams. She could pretty well guess what they were trying to do with each one, so Sakura started thinking. In fact, thinking about some of the strategies used by the ninjas in training, formations, and such things as this. She didn't know about soccer, but she knew how to keep somebody from getting something by using teamwork. Sakura quickly sketched out one of the more basic strategies the ninjas used, Naruto and Sasuke would be familiar with them as well as Hinata.

The coach looked over her shoulder as she wrote and then straightened up. "Right, uh, good job. We'll see if we can't test that one out sometime."

Practice had been a quick affair. Sakura had given the coach some notes on things to try and the woman had toddled off some where to 'correct' them, which meant in the language of students and teachers, 'Alright you smart little bugger let me go copy these in my own handwriting'.

Sakura and Hinata were sitting up in the stands after they'd had their little discussion. As they watched, Kimi appeared out of the locker rooms followed by Sasuke and Naruto. Sakura watched as Kimi started off across the field. She also watched as Naruto and Sasuke watched Kimi walk off across the field. She also watched Hinata as Hinata watched as Naruto watched Kimi walk across the field.

Sakura decided to curtail the rampant watching with a quick clearing of the throat that caused the two young men's heads to suddenly whip around. They quickly trotted up into the stands to join the real girls and to their merit (and continued survival) they didn't look back. All she heard as they approached were Naruto and Sasuke saying something about really liking soccer.

"Something interesting?" Sakura asked sweetly.

"Oh. No, just wondering about something." Naruto said sheepishly.

_Yeah, I bet._ Sakura thought sourly.

No one was really surprised when Kakashi suddenly appeared next to them. It was after all pretty well deserted around the stands now so they could talk privately. "Hello class." Kakashi said mildly.

"Hello sensei." They chimed in unison out of habit from the day's classes.

"I bring news. Apparently Kurenai has discovered that our assassin is indeed a man. We haven't got a positive identification yet, but it's definitely a man." Kakashi reported.

"That's good. That way we know that he's staying across the lake. Now we'll know where to look should he try anything. It's pretty hard for men to get around out here without attracting notice, even YOU have to be sneakier than usual sensei." Sakura said happily.

"Well don't get too cocky, apparently this guy has help of some sort. So keep your eyes open." Kakashi said sternly. "Now I've brought the two of you something."

"Us?" Sakura said looking to Hinata.

"Yes, it might look funny for two young girls with such devoted boyfriends not having pictures of them for their room, so I brought you these." Kakashi said as he produced a couple of picture frames and gave them to Sakura and Hinata. The two of them looked at the pictures that Kakashi must have taken of their first kiss and smiled. He really could be a sweet father figure sometimes.

Sakura stood up and she and Hinata gave Kakashi a great big hug, and for once in his life, probably the only time in his life, Kakashi simply hugged them back without being a pervert.

"So any more ideas on who the target might be?" Kakashi asked.

"No we're going spying this afternoon." Sasuke answered.

"Good, I'll keep to the woods and make sure our 'friend' has a hard time coming and going. I can only cover one side though." Kakashi told them.

"We'll keep a close eyes on the south side of the lake." Sakura told him.

"How did you know I wanted you to cover the south side?" Kakashi asked.

"Because the north side is where the girls dorms are." Sakura said snidely.

"That's my girl." Kakashi said mussing Sakura's hair like a five year old.

Sakura and Hinata were lying on their beds when the boys returned. The two of them came busting through the doors and barely shut them before they suddenly switched back to being boys. Naruto felt like an idiot standing there gasping for air in a skirt.

"Any luck?" Sakura asked them.

"Not really." Sasuke answered. "Each of the teachers has a room in the dormitory that's their responsibility. Junky stays downstairs on the first floor next to the stairs leading up. The only way in or out is past her room and the woman has pretty sharp hearing. She's been with the school for years and this dorm has a reputation for being one of the toughest to get into or out of without her noticing."

"You think the assassin might still be posing as one of the teachers?" Sakura asked.

"It's possible, just because he's a man doesn't mean he can't blend in like Naruto and I can. Besides, we really don't know who's helping him. He may very well have some of the teachers over here helping.

"I bet it's Furucho. She's a mean old lady." Naruto said vehemently. The old bat had been in charge of their detention. She had finally left to go do what old bats do, which was probably go scare small children and make gingerbread cottages.

"As much as I would like to agree Naruto, she's been here longer than nearly any other teacher. We also don't have any guarantees that the people helping this assassin are teachers. It could very well be students." Sasuke said seriously. "However, if it were somebody really close to the target, closer than we are, they'd probably have already had the opportunity to kill or kidnap them."

"If it IS a matter of the assassin staying across the lake we'll have to look out for anything where the two schools have to get together." Sakura said as she suddenly looked up at Sasuke.

"The ball." The two of them said in unison.

Sasuke slapped his forehead and slouched against the wall. "I was really hoping we could be gone before I have to sing."

"I'm looking forward to my number!" Naruto said proudly.

"Glad somebody is." Sasuke shot back. "I'm exhausted, I'm just going to crash. I don't even have the chakra to go get a shower." Sasuke said as he headed for his bed fully clothed. Naruto decided that it sounded like a great idea, not that he'd ever confess that to Sasuke.

The two boys went over to the bunk beds and started climbing up. Naruto was just about to reach the top and sink into blissful oblivion when he heard Hinata's startled gasp.

He stopped and looked down quickly. "What 's wrong Hinata?" He asked in confusion.

Hinata's eyes were as wide as they could go and she had her hands up over her mouth and what looked like her bleeding nose. He glanced over to Sakura and she was likewise trying to stop the flow of blood as she was looking up at Sasuke and blushing furiously. Naruto was finally brought back to reality by Hinata's question.

"Uh, Naruto-kun? Where's your underwear?"


	9. Synchronization

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 9. Synchronization.**

Naruto woke up early for once. He'd been going to school here for a couple of weeks now, so it was to be noted that this was a first. He slowly moved his hand down to his shorts to confirm his suspicions. He felt something warm and sticky. _Great._ This had happened before, but never as a girl. He had hoped girls didn't HAVE this problem.

Naruto sighed and got up. It was still rather early. He could probably get up and get cleaned off before anyone else woke up. Naruto got up and winced at the pain from climbing down the ladder. Sensing something wasn't right; Naruto looked down at his shorts and then looked at his hand.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH" Naruto screamed at the top of his lungs.

Three other ninjas hit the ceiling, or in Hinata and Sakura's case the bunk bed above them. When one belongs to a profession inclined towards paranoia one doesn't like loud screams coming at you from a dead sleep.

Sasuke or rather Shiori was the next one down, admittedly for the express purpose of killing Naruto, when Sasuke saw his own shorts. "What the…" Sasuke said in astonishment.

"We've been injured!" Naruto wailed looking down his shorts.

Sakura and Hinata were sitting up on their beds. "Oh shut up you two." Sakura said testily. "I didn't think it would happen to the two of you but I guess your jutsu makes you FULLY functional as a girl. I'm two days early Hinata, how about you."

"Right on time." Hinata said holding her abdomen and groaning.

"Right on time for WHAT Hinata?" Naruto asked.

The look he got back from Hinata was vicious. "Naruto. Leave me alone or I will kill you."

The dreadfully low voice in which she said it gave Naruto a moment to pause. He had heard other people talk like that normally right before severe violence was involved. He hadn't thought Hinata capable of such a thing. Then and there Naruto suddenly associated another emotion with Hinata. Fear. Most men had fear of women to some degree or another whether it was the fear of rejection when you asked one out or the general fear of the unknown. Being able to change into one, and generally getting nothing but rejection from Sakura had pretty much helped Naruto to conquer those fears. This fear was something different that could only be classified somewhere between 'Sorry I forgot your birthday dear' and 'I swear honey, I've never seen her before in my life'.

Naruto therefore made one of his rare wise decisions. He backed away… slowly. Then he hid behind Sasuke.

Sasuke was having similar problems. "Sakura, could you please tell me why I'm covered in blood?"

Sakura looked up and Naruto was reminded why Hinata was considered the kind and gentle one. She looked at the two of them with a thinly veiled intent to murder. "Sasuke. For once in your MISERABLE life could you please just pretend for a few minutes that THE WHOLE BLOODY WORLD DOESN'T REVOLVE AROUND YOUR THICK SKULL!"

Naruto cringed back from her rage and then looked up at Sasuke. To his surprise Sasuke's lips were trembling and tears started falling down his cheeks. "Well you don't have to be so mean about it." Sasuke said breaking down into tears.

Naruto stood there in blatant shock. There was NO explanation under the sun that could explain this.

"PMS." Sakura said simply to Hinata. She turned back to the two boys. "It's a monthly thing guys. Welcome to the gender. And to answer your question, I didn't think you'd be going through this so I didn't give you any pads."

"Pads?" Naruto said stupidly.

"These were my favorite panties too." Sasuke bawled.

"Yes pads, to catch the blood. Girls bleed once a month. It's accompanied by pain, irritability, and," She looked at Sasuke, "mood swings."

Naruto looked at Hinata and tried to remain calm. "I'm changing back. I'm not about to go through this." It was then that he suddenly realized that he wasn't using chakra. His heart began to sink a he looked at Sasuke in terror.

Sasuke had a similar expression as he too had tried to race back to his male form. Sasuke jumped up with a sudden murderous rage in his eyes. "You and your stupid jutsu. What if we're stuck like this?"

"I doubt that." Sakura said sorting through some things in her drawer. "Your body is going through its cycle. You probably won't be able to change back until it's complete. I wouldn't let go of your chakra either. It could present some problems if your body was to return to normal and you suddenly changed back into boys in the middle of class."

"We can't go out like this!" Sasuke said shrinking back from Sakura who was on him in a moment.

"Can and will little girl. We have a mission to complete. We have to do it once a month, so now you do too. Take it like a woman, and get cleaned up." Sakura ordered.

A thought suddenly struck Naruto, the time had gotten later and he could already hear girls heading for the showers, most of them grumbling. Was the whole dorm infected?

"Uh, Sakura. I thought you and Hinata took your showers in the morning." Naruto asked lamely.

Sakura stared at him for a moment and then looked at Hinata who only shrugged. "Well I guess after the floor show we got a couple of weeks ago it'll only be fair. We haven't got time to take turns and still get to class. You guys just stay at one end with your backs turned or something and no peeking."

Naruto looked stricken and looked at Hinata. She was already getting undressed.

"Here. You're going to need these." Sakura said handing a couple of white cylindrical objects to the two boys.

"What are these for?" Naruto asked with a sinking feeling hitting his stomach.

"They're to stop the blood."

"No WAY am I sticking anything down there." Naruto complained, but one look from Sakura and Hinata told him that 'Oh yes, you are'.

Sasuke and Naruto turned around while Hinata and Sakura wrapped themselves in a towel. Naruto just prayed that he didn't go psychotic like Hinata or weepy like Sasuke. This PMS stuff was apparently a pretty powerful force if it could alter personalities that wildly.

The 'boys' then wrapped themselves in a towel and got ready to go to the showers. The girls didn't bother turning around, it wasn't like they were getting to see their boyfriends naked, at least not again.

The four of them headed for the showers. Thanks to having to be taught the 'way of the woman', they were some of the last to arrive. Kimi was just coming out of the showers as the four of them arrived. She looked over at the four of them and stopped.

"Feeling a little down today, Shiori." Kimi asked giggling.

"I'd rather not talk about it." Sasuke said sulking.

"Aw, here honey let me make it better." Kimi said.

The three of them watched as Kimi planted a kiss on Sasuke, or rather Shiori. Naruto looked at Sakura. She looked ready to kill, but any words like 'hey that's my boyfriend you're kissing wench' would probably end the mission right there. Naruto decided to try to come to the rescue for once.

"Get away from her you slut." Naniko said pushing Kimi away. Kimi looked at Naniko and then grabbed her. Naruto wasn't expecting the kiss that got planted on his lips either.

"Don't worry honey. I'm not going to leave you out. I wouldn't dream of trying to take away your girlfriend from you." Kimi said huskily.

Naruto was thankful that Kimi couldn't see Sakura holding back Hinata from tearing the girls apart. Trying to keep Kimi's attention, he asked the only thing that popped into his mind. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't think I don't notice you two peeking at me in the showers. You two are pretty obvious. Like that time Shiori got 'sick' and then you took her to the nurse, but you ended up skipping class. I noticed the two of you didn't have any underwear on in the locker rooms later. I'm not stupid, I know what you were doing." Kimi said looking down at Naruto's bust under the towel. Suddenly, Naruto felt very exposed and clutched his towel a little tighter.

"We're not like you…" Naruto said meekly. He could feel his emotions running away with him. He shouldn't be this frightened of a girl he could kill twenty different ways.

"Sweet innocent Naniko." Kimi purred. "You might not be, but I guarantee Shiori is. After all sweetie, teachers usually can't afford the tuition here, and even if they could they wouldn't pay for one of their students to come here, unless they were sleeping with them of course. No, I think little miss rich and powerful over here arranged to have you enrolled along with her so she could bring you along for some fun and then had this teacher hand you that line."

"So what if I did?" Shiori said as she pushed Kimi away and put her arm around Naruto. Naruto had to think of her as Shiori, because the alternative was making his skin crawl worse than Kimi.

Naruto's lips were moving but nothing was coming out. Shock was spreading through him at an accelerated rate.

Kimi shrugged. "Well, I guess I always figured you'd be the dominant one in the relationship. Well, you girls keep me in mind if you get a little bored." Then she turned and headed out the door.

Naruto jumped back from Sasuke. "What was that all about?"

"She saw through your cover story dope. We're just lucky she jumped to the wrong conclusion." Sasuke said simply. "I guess everybody's going to think we're an item from here on out."

"Why was she so…" Naruto started.

"Horny?" Sakura supplied. "Unfortunately, that also happens right around this time as well. I kind of suspected Kimi would swing that way. We're still going to have to kill her though."

"Definitely." Hinata agreed.

"From now on you two better shower with us." Sakura said hotly. I'd rather dance around you two naked than have her getting anywhere near…"

"We still have a mission to finish." Sasuke said getting everyone back into focus. "We still have an assassination to deal with."

The sudden gasp let everyone know that they had just screwed up. Everyone turned to look as the last person to leave the shower threw her hands up to her face and looked past them toward the only door out of the room. Takara looked ready to faint as she backed into the showers. "You're all ninjas. Please don't kill me."

It had taken a great deal of persuasion to convince Takara that they weren't going to kill her. They didn't have much time to shower after that, and Sakura and Hinata spent most of the time sticking like glue to Takara to make sure she didn't try to bolt for the school gates at the first opportunity, or say anything to any of the other girls.

For the most part the day was a bit easier than they normally were. Arts class was the worst as Madame Furucho had been just as merciless in her drills as she was during the rest of the month. Naruto had wondered about this until Sakura had explained menopause. Apparently that was one well that dried up a LONG time ago. Sasuke had been the worst off since Madame Furucho seemed to genuinely hate Shiori and worked her harder than she did most. Sasuke had been ready to cry all morning.

Home economics had been pretty easy. They'd had ramen for lunch (Naniko's turn to cook), and Junky had looked about as ready to go lie down as the rest of them. Soccer had consisted of some pretty easy drills while the coach sat in the stands looking over soccer strategies with Sakura. All in all it would have been an easy day if it hadn't been for the cramps and needing to talk to Takara so desperately.

Finally the day was over and Sakura and Hinata 'invited' Takara over for some tea. Takara looked ready to faint again when they finally shut the door to the room. "I thought you said you weren't here to kill me."

"We're not, but that doesn't mean that you're in any less danger." Sakura said bluntly. "Why did you think we were here to kill you?"

"Because of what Daddy does for a living." Takara said sadly. "He used to be a ninja. We had to move around from time to time until he found a place in the government. They gave him a job and we never had to move around again. He's an ambassador to one of the 'hidden villages'."

The four ninjas were looking at each other seriously. It was possible they'd found the target.

"That still doesn't explain why you thought we were here to kill you." Sakura insisted.

Takara sighed. "A few months ago, I heard Daddy arguing with some men downstairs. They told him that if he didn't get them the information they wanted, they were going to do something to me. They also said they'd kill me if he told his superiors. Daddy said a little later that he was enrolling me here. I think he's doing it to hide me from them."

"Well, it looks like they found you." Sasuke said seriously. "Any idea where these men were from?"

"They said they were from the land of waves." Takara told them.

"That means hidden mist ninjas." Sakura said heavily.

"So can you help me?" Takara asked.

"That's apparently what we're here for." Naruto said. "Some spies passed the information along to the Hokage of our village. I guess they must have been friends of your father. We're here to make sure you DON'T get killed."

Takara was smiling and crying out of happiness. "Thank you."

Takara had gone back to her room for the night when there came a tap at the window. Sakura opened it up and Kakashi stepped inside. "I bring news."

"Let me guess." Sakura said sweetly. "You did some checking on Takara's father like Hinata asked you to, and come to find out he's an ex-renegade ninja who has been working as a spy for the government. He's been approached by ninjas from the village hidden in the mist and told that if he didn't give them information that his daughter was going to end up face down in the lake."

"Impressive, but no. I just wanted to let you know that this jounin is proving more troublesome than we expected. Kurenai has tried to track him, and I haven't been able to spot him moving back and forth from the other school. You four need to be REALLY careful." Kakashi said.

"You mean you didn't know Takara was the target?" Sakura asked surprised.

"No actually we figured that out a while ago, shortly after you interrogated the girls. I just wanted to see if YOU ever figured it out, good job. Takara's father is an ambassador to the village hidden in the rocks. He was apparently exiled from there for some reason and was being hunted until he hooked up with spies from the government." Kakashi said happily.

Sakura looked crestfallen. "Oh well, at least the job is going to get easier now that we know WHO they're going to try to kill. I guess we all have a new best friend."

"Actually, I only want one of you to stay with Takara. If all of you do it, then it might start looking suspicious. Hinata, how about you?" Kakashi asked.

Hinata nodded.

"Well, all we have to do now is ride out the semester and see if we can catch the assassin. We're pretty sure that they'll try it at the ball, so keep on your toes. Oh and here." Kakashi said tossing a sack down. "Here's some special 'equipment' that Sasuke and Naruto are going to be needing."

Naruto looked in the sack and thanked him half-heartedly. At least they wouldn't be using up Hinata and Sakura's 'supplies' before the mission was over.


	10. The Ball Part 1

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 10. The Ball Part 1.**

Things had pretty much settled into a rhythm over the past several weeks. Everyone had gotten back to normal. Sasuke was his unresponsive self, Hinata blushed a lot, Sakura was as bossy as ever, and Naruto was well… Naruto.

Naruto was glad to see everything pretty much back to normal with his friends. He and Hinata had been spending a lot of time talking and getting to know one another better. Technically speaking, having grown up together he should have already known her better than he did, but she had been shy and he had been too caught up in his own little world to ever notice her. For the first time in his life he wished that he could go back and relive his school days.

Now finally, their dream and their nightmare would be over. Classes had wound down and now it was the night of the grand ball. The four of them were in their dorm room getting ready for the ball. Unlike the other girls who would be trying to get their hair just right, the four ninja were trying to find new and interesting ways to hide a small arsenal inside their dresses.

So far Naruto had managed to hide four large shuriken, twenty small shuriken, fourteen flash bombs, and twelve kunai in the small slinky red dress that was meant to be as revealing as possible. Sasuke said he looked like slut.

"If you got it, flaunt it." Naruto said defensively.

"Shut up and hand me my garter." Sasuke said rolling his eyes. "Not that one, the one with the sheath attached."

Naruto had to admit sewing class had been quite useful. They'd learned a lot about customizing their clothing and altering garments that were usually mass produced for a generic size. Of course, Junky would have probably had a cow if she knew that the four of them had been altering their garments for. Hinata was exceptionally good at sewing. Her dress was white and had more hidden compartments, sheaths, pockets, and weapons than all the rest of them combined mostly because hers was the most modest dress among them. She even commented that had she wanted to she could probably have hidden a sword in there somewhere. Naruto just couldn't see it, and he'd watched her in that dress a great deal. She looked like a princess.

Sakura was dressed in a beautiful emerald green dress that would probably turn quite a few heads. If they knew how many knives she had down her bodice, they would probably politely turn back the other way as well.

Finally Sasuke was wearing a semi-modest blue dress that was done in three different shades. Due to his innate need to be the most skilled, he'd gone for complex patterns of lace, ruffles, and anything else that would fit on the fabric. When it came to such things, Sasuke had all the self-restraint of a deranged woodpecker in a lumberyard.

"We need to stick close to Takara all evening." Sasuke was saying. "I have to perform first. So Hinata and Sakura will have to watch Takara first. Naruto you go last so hang around the edges of the room and I'll join you as soon as I'm done. You guys don't have to sing until later, so Naruto and I will come take over for you while you're on stage."

Sakura looked over Naruto and Sasuke. The two of them had put on their own makeup that night. "You two actually look like proper young women, just PLEASE act like it." Sakura said pleading. "Oh, and Naruto, you might want to leave behind the flash bombs."

"Why?"

"Well, if some guy gets to aggressive and pats you in the wrong place I'm afraid you'll set off the smoke alarm." Sakura said glancing down to where Naruto had hidden the bombs.

"Kakashi said that Kiba and Shino are going to be at the party as well." Sasuke was saying. "If Takara heads out for the dance floor you two can grab one of them to follow her."

"What about you two." Sakura was saying. "Shino and Kiba have never seen you like this."

"I don't plan on dancing with any boys." Sasuke said levelly.

"That'll break a few hearts." Sakura said smiling.

The four of them went out and caught up to their classmates and headed for the recital hall that overlooked the lake. The four ninja took up positions around the group of girls and watched the darkness with trepidation.

Finally, the girls all walked into the hall where all the boys were waiting. The boys were standing around looking uncomfortable in their tuxedoes even though the windows had been opened to let in the cool lake air. Naruto nearly didn't recognize Kiba, whom he thought must have never worn formal attire in his life. Shino still had his shades and had managed to find a black scarf for his tuxedo that looked oddly fashionable and pretty much just looked like what Shino would look like in a tuxedo.

All the girls started mingling amongst the boys and the boys for the most part started congregating around Kimi and Sasuke. This did help the rest of them stay close to Takara, but Naruto never thought he'd see the day when Sakura would be shooting jealous glances at boys.

Madame Furucho walked towards the grand piano at one end of the room and slammed her cane into the floor. Everyone went dead quiet as they looked at her. "This evening we celebrate the initiation of young ladies and gentlemen into polite society. This evening you young men will be allowed the express privilege of watching some of my students perform for your pleasure. I expect all of you to act as mature adults and not disgrace your family names. With that said our first performance tonight will be by Shiori singing 'Think of me' from 'The Phantom of the Opera'.

Naruto watched the perimeter of the room. He knew Kakashi was supposed to be somewhere outside, and he could see Kurenai in a lovely strapless evening dress among the chaperones, but the open windows worried him. One good sniper…

Sasuke, or rather Shiori got up and sang her number. Sasuke found it better to give his female persona her own name. In a way it helped him to feel like it wasn't him up there making a fool out of himself singing some stupid opera song that Madame Furucho had picked out for him. She had picked out Naruto's number as well, mostly because Naruto was too lazy to have picked out his own. Though he was thankful she picked out something blessedly short.

Shiori sang as Sasuke watched the crowd. He hated the way that all the boys were watching him so intently. He did see with some satisfaction that he's managed steal their attention away from Kimi. That did please him in a sick and disturbing kind of way.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Sasuke finished with the shrill high-pitched note that Madame Furucho had brow beaten into him. He was more pleased that the experience was over than he was at having performed the song well. Madame Furucho met him as he stepped away from the piano.

"I knew that you could do it Shiori. I just want you to know how proud I am of you." Madame Furucho said smiling for the first time since he'd known her. "I never would have been so hard on you if I hadn't thought you were capable of such a beautiful performance."

Sasuke looked up at the woman in shock. Not knowing what to say he just looked down properly and said "Thank you Madame."

Sasuke curtsied as he'd been taught and quickly walked away. He realized that he was blushing from the compliment.

Sasuke walked towards the boys as the music began to play. A lot of them looked like they were going to ask him to dance. Sasuke had no intention of dancing. He was going to watch the perimeter of the room. He saw Kiba and Shino and decided that it would probably be good if he went over and stood close to them. Maybe the boys might get the wrong idea and leave him alone.

Shino watched as the hot little number came over to stand in front of him and Kiba. She had just sung one of the most beautiful songs that he had ever heard. He was quite moved.

It is to be noted that Shino was not as unemotional as everyone believed. He had emotions that ran just as deeply as any young man his age. He however was one of the manliest ninja that were among the rookie nine. Being unexpressive is a manly trait. As proof, consider the man who after having taken copious amounts of damage to his person merely stands there and either says nothing or merely 'ouch', and see how many people say 'What a man'.

Therefore Shino was looking on this extremely beautiful young woman standing directly in front of him and Kiba when he just simply couldn't help himself any longer. It is true after all; 'it's always the quiet ones'.

Sasuke felt the hand pat his bottom. He slowly turned around to look at the two behind him. Shino was standing there staring off into space as he normally does and Kiba was looking at him with a stupid grin on his face with a hand behind his head and the other doing a small wave.

Sasuke felt his face flush not from embarrassment, but from anger. He could feel the flames roaring in his eyes, and that's pretty much all he could hear in his ears.

At this point we must now give Kiba some credit. Having been taught by a kunoichi, Kiba was more in tune with the warning signs of an impending female attack. This actually gave him more preparation than most men get for married life. However, he had also unfortunately been trained much like the dogs Pavlov used in his experiments to respond to said stimulus with a specific response. Namely, he got a dumb look on his face and asked 'What did I do'. This was indeed unfortunate for him since any married man can tell you that this gets translated in the female brain as 'I did it'.

Luckily, the windows of the recital hall were open. Kiba would have been picking glass out of his face otherwise. The average enraged punch from a young woman is quite sufficient to send a man hurling out a second story window. The chakra enhanced punch delivered by one Uchiha Sasuke in drag was enough to send Kiba hurling far enough so that the next few things that he saw were (in order): branch, branch, branch, tree, branch, branch, squirrel, branch, Kakashi with a video camera, branch, branch, lake, water, fish, fish, lake bottom.

The young woman stormed off as Shino looked out the window that Kiba had so recently exited. He didn't think that Kiba was exactly aware of WHY he got hammered, but Shino wasn't about to tell him.

Shino looked back at the retreating back, well backside, of the gorgeous young singer and smiled. What a woman, and soooo firm.

Sasuke tried to get his blood pressure under control, the nerve of Kiba patting his bottom. _Men! I am NOT that kind of girl!_

Sasuke stopped and thought about his previous thoughts and shook his head. When he got back to Konoha he was going to watch nothing but war movies and go to hockey games for a month.

Sasuke watched as Takara finished her number. A couple of young men were waiting for her when she reached the dance floor. She nodded to one of them and they headed out for the dance floor while the music played the songs the dance music that separated each number. Sakura and Hinata looked up at him and he nodded. They looked around for Shino and Kiba, but didn't see them so Sakura grabbed the other young man and Hinata moved around the edge of the dance floor.

Sasuke looked around for Shino. He knew Kiba wouldn't be coming back for a while, if ever the pervert, but he wanted to see what happened to Shino. What he found was a solid wall of young men all looking for a dance. Sasuke moved among them trying to be polite. He wasn't getting very far and he saw Takara being escorted off the dance floor by her young man with Sakura and Hinata close behind.

In desperation, Sasuke looked around and finally saw Shino. Then he remembered something Kimi once told him. _Me personally, I find it best to go find a friend that I can rely on and then I have him pose as my boyfriend. That generally keeps most of the less serious crushes away._

Sasuke grinned to himself. Perfect. He'd carry Shino out to the veranda, it looked dark and secluded, and tell him who he was then he could keep the boys off while he tried to find Takara again.

Sasuke walked over to Shino and surprised him by looping an arm around his. "Hello handsome, why don't you and I step out onto the veranda for some fresh air?" Sasuke said trying to act like the typical fan girl that usually tried to rape him.

Shino gave no indication of recognition, but allowed himself to be pulled toward the veranda. Sasuke smiled sweetly at the boys who were now leaving and going back to bothering Kimi and started looking around for the girls.

Deep inside the placid exterior of Shino was a young, excited, and very typical teenage male was screaming, "YYYYYEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSS!".

So it came to pass that a totally clueless Shino and a totally clueless Sasuke stopped to get their picture taken by the photographer that the school had hired to give the students a memento of the evening before heading out onto the veranda that was appropriately called 'make out vista' over looking the lake.

It was shortly after, that the guests turned to see Shiori come running back into the room as fast as her legs would carry her. No one knows EXACTLY what happened out there on the veranda and considering the taciturn nature of the two young men involved it most likely never will. However it IS known that from that day forward Uchiha Sasuke's boxer shorts always smelled like Raid.

Tanako Chiko raced down the stairs. Ahead, the sounds of fighting could still be heard. Chiko stopped in front of the doors leading down into the boiler room of the recital hall and pushed them in slowly. Inside the light was dimmer, but the figure of the two boys standing over the two girls while Takara huddled in the corner was clearly visible.

Chiko looked down at the form of the pink-haired girl and her roommate. She remembered them from the incident where their boyfriends had broken into the school. "I see they didn't give you boys any trouble."

"Like some stupid kunoichi is going to beat us!" The oldest said.

Chiko nodded and turned to the girl. "Well, Takara, it's an honest shame that you won't be seeing your father again. The look on Mitsui-san's face when he hears you were killed is going to be priceless."

"So YOU'RE the assassin?" Two voices said together as Chiko turned to see the blonde and the raven-haired roommates of the two girls standing in the door.

"Ah, I see the leaf sent four kunoichi. Tell me girls, how do you hope to defeat me?" Chiko said settling into a fighting stance.

"By surprise." Sakura said holding the kunai to the back of her head. Chiko glanced back to see that the two boys were the actual ones lying on the floor at the feet of Sakura and Hinata.

Chiko grinned and then collapsed into a pool of water.


	11. The Ball Part 2

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Chapter 11. The Ball Part 2**

"We're going to need all of our chakra, Naruto." Sasuke said dropping the jutsu.

Naruto dropped his jutsu as well and the two of them started advancing toward Sakura and Hinata in the basement. Naruto scanned the darkness looking for the jounin.

"Did you two call for Kurenai or Kakashi?" Sakura asked.

"Didn't have time." Sasuke said seriously.

"Where is she?" Naruto said scanning the darkness trying to be ready for the next attack. Sadly he failed.

The speed of the assault reminded Naruto of a torrent of water. He never saw it coming. Suddenly, he felt a fist ramming into his ribs and felt like a locomotive had rammed into him. Naruto sailed through the air crashing into the wall behind Sakura and Hinata. Sasuke was dodging as best he could. He was ducking rapid blows from the woman who had ambushed them.

Sasuke managed a few good strikes that hardly seemed to slow the woman down as she ducked and lashed out ripping the front of Sasuke's dress. Naruto got up and drove forward to the attack. Hinata and Sakura both tossed kunai at the jounin, but miraculously the woman seemed to be able to move more swiftly than a vapor. Both kunai missed and Naruto reached the fight just in time to see Sasuke go done with an elbow to the base of his skull.

Naruto jumped in swinging. He landed several good blows backing the woman up from his friends. He could hear Hinata cheering him on as he forced the jounin back. Everything was going great until she caught his fist.

"My turn." She said lowly.

The series of blows to Naruto's stomach felt like a tidal wave was slamming debris into his torso. The final blow ripped the front of his dress and sent him sailing through the air to land next to Sasuke.

Hinata and Sakura were there helping the two of them up in an instant.

"Come on guys. We can do it if we all rush her at once." Sakura said confidently.

"No." Sasuke said simply.

Naruto and Sasuke struggled to stand. Sakura was looking at them strangely.

"This is a jounin. There's no way we're going to be able to win. The only way we're going to beat him is if Naruto and I distract him while you go get Kakashi and Kurenai." Sasuke said spitting up a little blood. "Did you sense it to Naruto?"

Naruto nodded. He'd sensed it, and it REALLY ticked him off. "You know the sexy no jutsu too."

The woman laughed. "Is that what you call it? I just figured it was a little specialty jutsu I'd come up with for completing this mission. I never bothered to give it a name."

Tanako Chiko pulled the skirt off from around her waist and tossed it aside as she shifted into the form of a man. "Takai at your service, assassin from the village hidden in the mists. I don't think I'm going to be able to let you four leave. After all, if you're working for that jounin that's been staking out all the girls dorms, I can't risk him getting here."

"So these are your sons?" Sakura said in astonishment.

"Yes, and also my apprentices. Why do you look so surprised? I didn't lie when I said my sons were attending the boarding school across the lake, but I never said that I was their mother." Takai said with a grin.

Takai started to laugh when he suddenly stopped. Hinata gasped and Naruto noticed the blade sticking out of his chest, a blade that was attached to a sword being held by Madame Furucho.

Stunned, Takai slid off the end of the blade and turned around to look at Madame Furucho. Madame Furucho looked at the man dispassionately before driving the blade in again from the front. Then with a quick turn of her wrist, Takai fell to the floor.

"If I have taught you children nothing else this semester, always remember this. Make bloody well sure you know how many ninja you're up against before you start a fight, and NEVER keep your back to the door." Madame Furucho said as she sheathed the long sword blade back into her cane.

Kakashi and Kurenai came running into the room just as Madame Furucho turned. They skidded to a halt in front of her with their weapons drawn. Kakashi looked around the room before settling his eye on the old woman.

"Might I ask what's going on here?" Kakashi asked slowly.

"Ah Kakashi, you must have been the ninja I've sensed running around spying on my girls while they're in the showers." Madame Furucho said. "And you must be Kurenai. I must admit your more lovely in person child."

"Wait a minute, you're…" Kakashi started.

"Madame Furucho here. I left any other name behind a long time ago." Madame Furucho said looking around. "I take it these children are your students?"

"Yes, Madame Furucho." Kakashi said respectfully.

"You mean you were here to protect Takara too?" Naruto said in surprise.

"No, not as such. I teach the arts here. I retired from being in ANBU a long time ago. Takara's father was one of my students. He knew I was here, so he contacted me and told me what was going on with Takara. I've been keeping an eye out for trouble. I do not like people coming and making my home into a ninja battlefield." Madame Furucho said simply.

"So you came down here when you saw us leave the party?" Sakura said.

"Yes, I did. You and Hinata still have a performance to do. I don't spend my days wearing dresses just to hide you know." Madame Furucho said putting a finger to the side of her nose.

"You mean you're…" Sasuke said stunned.

"In hiding." Madame Furucho said severely. "I built a reputation as one of the most deadly assassins in the world using charm and beauty, and I didn't even need a jutsu. There is after all, more than one use for a dark secluded little rendezvous spot."

"So why did you choose to stay here?" Sakura asked.

"There are people that would very much like to see me dead. There's so much blood on my hands that I doubt that I'll ever wash it all off. Still, etiquette and grace were a couple of the skills I perfected during my professional days that I thought might be useful to the future generations for less, shall we say lethal purposes. Teaching is something I've always enjoyed." Madame Furucho said smiling. "Now, Hinata, Sakura, you're on in just a few moments. You better get going."

"Oh man, I ripped my dress. I can't do my number like this!" Naruto said sadly.

"Well, that reassures my belief in happy endings." Sasuke said smiling.

Sakura and Hinata headed off with Kurenai to get ready for their performance. Naruto looked at the ruins of his and Sasuke's dresses and looked around.

"Well, I guess the night's over for us." Naruto told Sasuke.

"Not necessarily." Madame Furucho said. "These boys here look to be about you size. Why don't you take their suit and go watch the rest of the ball as men. I'm sure Hinata and Sakura would appreciate it if their boyfriends were to watch them perform and perhaps dance with them afterwards."

Madame Furucho turned to leave, but before she did she looked severely at Kakashi. "Kakashi, do dispose of the body and see to it that these boys are taken into custody. They never saw me, so they'll probably have some sort of grudge against your people for killing their father. Oh, and one other thing…"

Madame Furucho whipped out her blade and had it to Kakashi's throat in an instant. "I take teaching and caring for my girls just as seriously as you take teaching these children seriously. If I EVER catch you around the windows of my dormitory again peeking in at the girls taking showers, you'll need TWO eye patches."

For the first time in his life Naruto saw Kakashi nervous. "Yes, ma'am." He said meekly.

Naruto and Sasuke dragged the unconscious boys off to a handy storage room and stripped their suits off of them before ditching them in the room and locking them in. They then looked at the ruins of their dresses and started to change.

Naruto glanced over at Sasuke as he was changing and noticed something odd.

"Lingerie?" Naruto asked.

"What? It's extremely comfortable, and you can fight in it." Sasuke said defensively.

(A/N: In Sasuke's defense, since the garment in question was designed for activities in which being agile, dexterous, and flexible are a plus it stands to reason that such garments would wear well in a fight, after all he was wearing a white Frederick's of Hollywood satin ice merry widow corset, item #51141. Not that I looked it up or anything cough.)

"Man, all I did was not wear any underwear in case we had to change back. Are you going to wear that under the tuxedo?" Naruto asked.

"No I'm not going to wear this under the tuxedo, and that was more information than I needed, thank you." Sasuke replied.

Sakura tried to calm herself as she sat down at the piano. She and Hinata had worked on this number all semester. Madame Furucho had started not to allow them to perform it until she heard them play it for her. Hinata was ready and Sakura took a moment to steady herself.

She looked up in time to see Sasuke and Naruto come into the recital hall wearing tuxedoes. Shino had seen them and was walking over to greet them, which meant that he was basically just standing next to them. For some reason Sasuke stepped to the other side of Naruto as Shino approached. Sakura sighed. She could already see Kimi and a bunch of the other girls making a beeline straight to Sasuke. Madame Furucho cleared her throat and Sakura readied herself to play the haunting melody.

Kakashi sat outside the recital hall and watched the girls getting ready for their number. He had spent the past few months watching them get closer to the boys. He really did wish them the best, much like a father would. There was only the issue of Naruto's lingering crush on Sakura getting in the way. Kakashi thought about it for a moment and then slipped from his hiding place. With everyone watching the girls, he could probably slip under the piano without being noticed. He was going to make sure that this was one performance that Uzumaki Naruto never forgot.

Naruto watched the girls getting ready to perform. For the most part he was watching Hinata. Sakura was beautiful tonight as well, but there was something about the way the spotlight shone off of Hinata's white gown. She looked more beautiful than Naruto ever remembered. She also looked nervous and Naruto hoped she wouldn't faint as he caught her eyes. She smiled, and Naruto tried to look encouraging. Naruto caught his breath as Sakura began a beautiful melody on the piano and Hinata began to sing.

_I know there's something in the wake of your smile,_

_I get a notion from the look in your eyes, yeah,_

_You've built a love,_

_But that love falls apart,_

_Your little piece of heaven, falls apart…_

_Listen to your heart,_

_When he's calling for you,_

_Listen to your heart,_

_There's nothing else you can do,_

_I don't know where you're going,_

_And I don't know why,_

_But listen to your heart,_

_Before,_

_You tell him good-bye…_

Kakashi got into position under the piano. No one had seen him. Everyone was transfixed by Hinata's voice and Sakura's playing. Looking out at the audience, Sasuke and Naruto were standing there stunned. They'd apparently never heard the two girls practicing. Naruto looked like he had tears in his eyes. Kakashi began the hand signs as Hinata launched into the second verse. He timed it so that he'd give Naruto something to think about. Kakashi finished just as Hinata reached the climax of the song and he released his chakra. He whispered, "Angel no jutsu."

Naruto couldn't believe his eyes as he looked up at Hinata. As Sakura began to raise the volume of her piano in a crescendo, the light seemed to gather into Hinata's gown until she was glowing and radiating light all on her own. She began to float above the stage as her voice rang out, and a pair of beautiful white wings seemed to appear behind her.

_And there are voices that long to be heard,_

_So much to mention but you can't find the words,_

_The scent of magic,_

_The beauty that's been,_

_When love was wilder,_

_Than the wind,_

Listen to your heart… 

(A/N: I do not own 'Listen to your Heart' by DHT or any other version. If you would like to hear this song it is track 12 on their CD. The dance remix is pretty cool too.)

Sakura echoed Hinata's voice as they sang together. Naruto could feel the emotion in the song the two of them were playing. He looked at Sasuke who stared intently at Sakura as she played. _I'd have to kill him to get to Sakura._ Naruto thought sadly. Then he looked up at Hinata and smiled. He really couldn't bring himself to think of her as second prize. She was just the grand prize he never knew he had won.

Hinata softly glided to the floor as the light faded from her and the wings disappeared. For the longest time no one said a word, they were simply too stunned. Naruto walked forward to Hinata and offered her his arm. As he guided her away from the piano the applause began and didn't stop for quite some time.

Sakura smiled at Naruto and Hinata as they were headed out to the dance floor. They really were a beautiful couple. Madame Furucho nodded to her and then set off to go get the next girls ready for their number.

Sakura looked around until she saw Sasuke. He was being practically dragged toward the darkened veranda by a tide of about five girls, which included Kimi. Sakura politely got up and curtsied before heading off to the veranda. There she found them trying to collectively molest her Sasuke.

Sakura growled and pushed up her sleeves.

What happened next could possibly be called a catfight. This however would have been a misnomer. Cat's when fighting generally do a lot of hissing and batting at each other and the occasional bite. Cats that do more than this generally take down large prey and are NOT referred to as kitty. This was therefore not a catfight. This was a ticked-off-kunoichi-stomping-a-mudhole-into-the-rear-ends-of-five-primpy-little-rich-girls fight.

Needless to say, it did not last long. Sasuke was looking at the carnage left by his enraged girlfriend and turned to her as she straightened her dress and than came over to wrap her arms around his waist.

"I've always wondered." Sasuke said. "Exactly what causes girls to think that just because you've kissed them that there is some sort of contract that specifically states that you now belong to them."

"That my dear Sasuke is what is called 'reality'." Sakura said sweetly. She slipped out a dagger and laid it against his back. "Now kiss me before you get hurt."

Sasuke smiled and kissed Sakura out on the veranda to the groans of her rivals. Yes, Sasuke could have probably snatched the knife out of her hands easily and walked away, but Sakura was beginning to understand that with some men and Uchiha Sasuke in particular, they just needed an excuse not to run away.


	12. Epilogue

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Naruto in any form shape or fashion. If I did, I would have already killed him and taken Hinata for myself…

**Epilogue.**

The four young ninja walked along the pathway with their instructor.

"Sensei, I meant to ask. Why are you pulling that cart?" Naruto asked innocently.

"Souvenirs." Kakashi said with a grin that shown through his mask.

"You know sensei, I didn't see you with your usual perverted books this entire mission." Sakura added.

"Unnecessary." Kakashi said vaguely.

_Redundant, would be the word I'd use._ Sasuke thought as he once again shifted uneasily. It was taking some time to get used to walking around with 'things' that needed to be adjusted occasionally.

He looked at their small group. Sakura was hanging onto his arm, annoyingly, and Hinata was holding Naruto's hand. The girls each carried a trophy as well.

"That sure is a big trophy, Hinata." Naruto said for perhaps the tenth time.

"Yeah, I'm happy we won it." Sakura said looking at the trophy that Hinata was carrying. Then she hefted the one she was carrying as well.

"It isn't fair. We did all the work how come YOU get to keep the soccer trophy Sakura?" Naruto whined.

"Because Hinata and I agreed that she could keep the singing trophy and I would keep the soccer trophy. Besides, I DID manage the team and come up with the plays." Sakura said sweetly.

"It still isn't fair." Naruto griped.

"Yeah, WE did all the work." Sasuke added.

Sakura smiled at the two of them. "Well you know. You're right. You two should get this trophy. In fact, I'll go around and tell everyone in the village how the two of you single handedly won the GIRL'S regional soccer championship."

Sasuke and Naruto looked at each other. "Keep it." They said glumly.

Sakura smiled. After all, out witting someone to get a trophy was probably more rewarding than putting out all the blood sweat and tears it took to win the thing in the first place. They traveled on in silence for a short while until the inevitable happened.

"You know Hinata, that sure is a big…" Naruto started as Hinata lightly put her hand over his mouth.

"Shut up Naruto." Hinata said smiling up at him. "You're cuter when you're quiet."

Sasuke made it a point to send Hinata flowers anonymously once they reached the village to say thank you. Besides, it would drive Naruto crazy trying to find out who did it.

The five of them kept walking until they reached the branch in the pathway that led to the other side of the lake. There they found Shino, Kiba, and Kurenai.

"Hey guys, guess what. Shino got himself a girlfriend!" Kiba said laughing.

Sasuke stared at the two of them for a moment. Surely, they had to have figured it out by now.

Shino took out a photograph. Naruto, Hinata, and Sakura were trying to keep straight faces. They had similar photographs that the four of them had taken at the ball. Naniko and Shiori weren't in any of them, but she was in this one.

They all looked at Sasuke and he shook his head. "You guys go on ahead. I'll tell him." Sasuke said as the group walked a little further up the path leaving Sasuke alone with Shino.

Sasuke looked at Shino who looked back at him impassively. "If you EVER tell anybody what happened out there on the veranda, I WILL kill you." Sasuke said through his embarrassment before walking back toward his friends.

Shino watched as everyone turned to go. A single tear slid down his cheek as he looked down at the picture he'd gotten from that night. He turned to drop it on the path and then seemed to reconsider. He then put the picture away and started off after everyone. A man could dream…


End file.
